


The Seven Days of Cobsmas

by mizunoiro



Category: OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Comedy, Domestic, Drama, Fluff, Holidays, M/M, Romance, Romantic Comedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-19
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:33:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 34,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28152426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mizunoiro/pseuds/mizunoiro
Summary: It’s almost Cobsmas, and magic is afoot. But what’s a hero to do with that when he has no powers, no patience, and no plans for Cobsmas? Well, apparently, he can get shipped off from NRC to some quaint place called Lakewood to be the bodyguard of none other than Mr. Claus - the human personification of Cobsmas, a ray of sunshine, and the bane of Laserblast’s current existence.And if that isn’t enough, the whole world seems to be out to teach him about the True Meaning Of Cobsmas (TM). But he’s having none of that! None at all, is that clear!?
Relationships: Lord Boxman/Laserblast (OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes), Lord Boxman/Professor Venomous (OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes)
Comments: 52
Kudos: 28





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! Remember me? :)  
> Exactly two weeks ago, I was visited by a representative of the Plot Bunny Association and I was informed that what this fandom really needs right about now is a holiday rom-com about our favorite villains. So here it is!
> 
> It's partially inspired by OK KO's ending theme, "It's only magic," which continues to be a really sweet little song.
> 
> And this is a pic of Mr. Claus from the show, for whoever doesn't remember him!
> 
> ****  
>    
> 
> 
> Enjoy!

It was but a week to Cobsmas, and Mr. Claus anticipated it in a way that he had not done in a long, long time. This one was going to be different - he could feel it in the fluffy snow falling outside his window, and in the smell of corn dishes wafting from every home, and in the festive spirit of the people busily getting ready for the celebrations. And he knew that the true soul of the holiday would shine even brighter in the quaint, growing town of Lakewood that he had chosen for his special purpose.

So he got up from his armchair, rubbed his hands together and stepped out on his balcony in the mild, snowy night. He finally felt ready to perform this one last miracle, and he took a deep breath and gathered to himself the Cobsmas magic, giving it the shape he needed. And then he breathed out and let it fly out into the world, and towards the brave, handsome, charismatic hero that he had chosen to receive it. He watched it go, and then sighed contentedly. After a few peaceful moments, he went back inside to prepare for his trip to Lakewood.

Unbeknownst to him, the magic wobbled, and fizzled, and even lost its way a couple of times. And then, just as it was about to reach its intended recipient, a small pink baby rat came out of nowhere and whacked it a few times with an ear of grilled corn, which, as everyone knows, is magical all on its own, but especially so around the time of Cobsmas. But the magic didn’t understand that something had been done to it, not really, and so it just did what magic does best...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would absolutely
> 
> **LOVE**
> 
> to hear what you have to say about this fic, Laserblast, the holidays, the weather, your cat, your breakfast, or read a few masterful keyboard smashes or artistic strings of emoji!
> 
> No comment is too small or too late!


	2. The Holiday Spirit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And this is our girl Sunshine, who in the canon is the teacher of the charisma discipline at POINT Prep, a master of empathic weather magic and an overall charisma enthusiast.
> 
> Enjoy!

♪♪♪ On the first day of Cobsmas, my baby gave to me a scar that looks like a V ♪♪♪

* * *

Mentally, Laserblast was in his beloved, wonderful hole in the ground below his dear, old donut shop. It was a lovely hole - deep, dark, and above all: blissfully empty of anyone else at all. Not a soul. Just him, all alone in the deep, dark hole. 

“And a very jolly Cobsmas to you too!” he intoned.

He should have stayed there, he really should have, he thought as the screeching, flashing, shoving, giggling, smelly, swarming tsunami of a mall crowd crashed against his glorified mall booth and the barely existent walls of self-control he still had. His simmering anger was one wrong word away from a full-on meltdown. It always was, these days.

“Have a great Cobsmas, ma’am!” he saluted.

Yes, he should have stayed in his miraculous hole. And he would have, too, had it not been for the unconscious pink rat-baby that he’d found just inside the entrance, realising with searing guilt that his own experiments and the following explosion must have turned her into… whatever she was now. Just a kid, he supposed.

“Please stay back, sir, and a very jolly Cobsmas!” he warned one merry mall-goer that got too close to his charge.

Now if he could just keep thinking about her, all the way back in Neo Riot City, for the entire three days until this whole unholy abomination of a job was over, maybe he could go through it without killing anyone. Cob, how he _hated_ Cobsmas.

“Ho-ho-ho!” went his charge next to him and elbowed him in the ribs. “Come on, my lad, get more into the Cobsmas spirit! The whole of Lakewood is here to see us!”

 _My lad_ , he echoed mentally, his eye starting to twitch below the blessed helmet visor.

“We should wrap up your appearance here already, Mr. Claus,” he replied with a death’s-head smile. “Pace yourself, there are two more days and a lot of people who want to see you.” He paused, grin becoming even more strained. “So. Many. People.”

“I’ll just nip into that toy store over there to say hi to the kiddies, alright?” Mr. Claus ignored him cheerfully. “You can stay here and talk to your own fans, I’ll be fine.”

Before he could object that he’d rather be stuck on top of a Cobsmas tree like a corn topper, the disgustingly holiday-spirited old man whooshed away into the toy store, leaving him alone at their booth table. 

Someone shoved a horribly cheerful pamphlet in his face that read “Lakewood Plaza Turbo - The biggest, most cheery, most holiday-spirited Cobsmas extravaganza you’ll see this year! Feel the True Holiday Spirit with us!” He briefly spared the energy to actually worry about whoever had thought of that one before he chucked it away. He needed a cherry sucker.

Cob, he hated celebrity bodyguard duty even more than he hated Cobsmas. Combine the two? It was pure unadulterated _hell_. Once he was back in Neo Riot City, he was going to have _words_ with Dr. Greyman, whose idea this had been. Words that could only be found in urbandictionary.corn. 

And on top of it all, did everyone need to keep trying to impart “wisdom” to him about the “true spirit of Cobsmas,” whatever that was!?

The single thing that could possibly somehow make this even worse was…

“Oh, hullo there! What a fine-looking hero we got here!” chirped the short guy with the big baby stroller.

_This. Cob, this._

He had grabbed him by the shirt front before he could even finish the thought and dragged him over the table.

“If _one_ more single milf or dilf with an adorable, very holiday-spirited little girl attempts to teach me, the big city slicker, the true meaning of Cobsmas, _I swear I ain’t gonna be held responsible,_ ” he growled an inch away from the round dad’s face.

“Well, excuuuuuse me,” the guy fluffed up, seeming to go almost double in size with indignation. “First of all, they’re _quadruplets_ and none of them have decided yet to be girls!” He screeched, pulling his shirt front from Laser’s grip with surprising strength.

“Second, I’m not a dilf, I’m a _hunk_ , thankyouverymuch!” He said, standing proudly on the booth table, adjusting his bow-tie and dripping with scorn.

“And last but not least,” he grinned like a shark and reached into the big baby stroller. “I HATE COBSMAS! Hands up, _big city slicker_! On the floor!”

Laserblast’s whole field of vision was filled with the business end of a rapidly charging laser bazooka.

 _Oh Cob, YES_ , his mind roared and cheered.

Laserblast leaped.

* * *

That was _glorious_ , Laser snickered to himself as he strode unsteadily back towards the toy store through the blissfully, divinely _empty_ mall. His shoulder was bleeding from where he had landed in a POINT action figurine display case and he was sore all over and his head rang like sleigh bells, but the echoing crunch of Cobsmas ornaments and corn snacks and discarded junk under his boots was music to his ears. He loved a good adrenaline high, and he loved it even more when it thrashed a whole mall of Cobsmas madness, and boy, had the cute round villain _delivered_ an adrenaline high.

Yeah, this is what good heroism had to be all about! None of all that “smile, pose, shake hands, try not to call them cobsuckers” business. Plus, he had burned enough stress to keep him from murdering anyone for _hours_! Days, even!

Back at the toy store, he took one look around, reached behind the counter and pulled out one rather pale Mr. Claus.

“How are you, sir?”

“W-what was that all about!?” Mr. Claus squeaked as soon as he was placed on his feet once again.

“Just a routine villain attack. Absolutely nothing to worry about. Did you know that guy with the bazooka?”

“No!” And then his eyes went even rounder. “Is he after me!?”

“Well, he _was_ shouting that he hates Cobsmas, and he _did_ ask where you were hiding, so I’d say yes. You’re sure you don’t know him?”

“Of course not!” Mr. Claus fretted. “But how can this be! It isn’t possible! _Everyone_ loves Cobsmas! The magic of the true spirit of Cobsmas reaches...”

His speech died down in the face of Laserblast, who leveled him with a stare that, had his helmet been on, would have leveled an entire city block.

“Right,” Laser said dryly. “Let’s get you back home quickly anyway. We’ve both had enough publicity for one day.”

“Oh, my,” Mr. Claus continued to fret, looking around as if he was seeing a toy store for the first time. “This is very distressing. Most unusual. I wonder if...”

Laser strongly urged him towards the door. It wasn’t strictly necessary to mention that it wasn’t the return on the villain that bothered him; he just wanted out before all their fans crawled out from wherever they had hidden. The woodwork, probably. His adrenaline was keeping him happy and sane for the moment, and he wanted to escape before it wore off.

And then, once Mr. Claus was safely stashed under lock and key, he could start looking for that cu- erm, _cu… nning_ , round villain guy. For heroic reasons, of course. Business and all. Yes.

And then there would be only two more days left of his bodyguard duty. With enough cherry suckers and dissociation, maybe this whole thing could be salvaged yet, he thought optimistically.

* * *

Or maybe not, he thought glumly, sucker in one cheek.

Laserblast squatted in the corner of his room in the rented villa where he and Mr. Claus were staying for the duration of his visit to Lakewood and took a look at the charger bar of his helmet.

“So how’s she doing, Sparks?” he asked into his phone, eyes glued to the bar, and he plopped back on his butt. This couldn’t be happening. Not now. Not here.

“Aw, she misses me? That’s so sweet!” he cooed and then snickered while Carol expressed her opinion on the manner in which Fink missed him. “Well, she _is_ a rat, and she _does_ have good teeth, and she _does_ bite,” he explained and poked at the charger. He had completely forgotten. How could he have forgotten?

“Listen, just take my tablet, put on some playlist of rat videos, and leave it next to her, er, crib. She likes watching them. Just make sure it doesn’t scroll to something else, like demolition videos. Unfortunately, she likes those very much, too… No, Sparks, I won’t tell you how I know that.”

While Carol told him more of the local NRC gossip, he prodded his bandages, wondering what he should do. He winced. Flesh wounds were little more than annoyances, but it occurred to him for the first time that, well, accumulate enough of them and they might become a real problem, now that he...

“Hey Sparks, do you think I should get a full-body suit?” he asked idly while staring at the charger bar. “Cover up a bit?”

Big mistake. He knew it as soon as the question got out of his mouth. He didn’t need to hear the diplomatic silence on the other end.

“Oh, yes, let me guess,” he hissed nastily. “My look is part of my image and it’s more important than ever to maintain it, now that I don’t have any powers, yes? Am I getting it right?”

When Carol started to say something about charisma and contributing within one’s means, he hung up. He was allergic to that word, these days. And he’d heard that speech and variations thereof from practically everyone who knew about his… situation. He’d never understood any of it.

As far as he was concerned, ‘charisma’ only meant that everyone was too busy mooning over his looks and superficial charm to notice that there was next to nothing underneath. Anyone who got swayed by that fabled ‘charisma’ was an idiot in his book. Gullible and convenient, but an idiot nonetheless. And he was surrounded by them on all sides.

The irony didn’t escape him that it was a very unfortunate outlook on life for someone whose one single strength left was the cobsdanged ‘charisma.’ He crunched the remains of his sucker and spit out the stick.

He leaned back on his hands and stared absently through the window, up at the fluffy snow falling from the sky that should have been grey and depressing, but instead was painted red and yellow and pink from the cheerful lights of Lakewood’s city center. Twas the season to be jolly, and he had never felt more miserable in his life. Cob must have sent him on this bodyguarding mission to this disgustingly cheerful little town specifically to mess with him. It was all so… _quaint_.

His charging helmet beeped and his eyes shot back to the charging bar.

2%, the bar read.

It had been two hours.

“Gut me and hang my guts for garlands,” he swore and buried his face in his knees. “I won’t survive this Cobsmas without a helmet.”

* * *

Laser, in his civvie outfit, a big muffler and with a suspiciously bulging backpack, slithered to the enthusiastic bright young local hero guarding the premises of the rented villa. 

“Hey there.”

Thunder sounded, and the young hero practically teleported up a tree. Laser stared at the singed patch on the ground at his feet where a mini-lightning bolt had just landed and belatedly realised that the hero was vaguely stormcloud-shaped. 

“Oops?” he shrugged charmingly and grinned up.

“Who are you, evildoer!” The cumulus hero squeaked from up in the tree and pointed her sparkling finger at him.

“Evildoer?” Laser looked around. “It’s me. Laserblast. The hero from NRC that’s guarding Mr. Claus?” 

“No way! You look just like a villain! Look at that smirk! And that stubble!”

Affronted, Lasrblast self-consciously rubbed his (admittedly, not entirely baby-butt smooth) cheek and glared, contributing even further to his evil look. 

“It’s almost Cobsmas and the forces of evil are afoot, trying to vanquish the true spirit of Cobs-”

Laser kicked the tree and, after a brief internal struggle, caught the cumulus hero that dropped like a frozen apple from it.

“Would a villain catch you so gently?” he cooed.

The young cumulus hero blushed furiously and shook her head.

“And what’s your name, sunshine?” he grinned as evilly as he could, just to mess with her.

“Sunshine?”

“Oh.” Laser’s grin slipped. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to sound patronizing or anything.”

“No, no,” the hero shook her head vigorously. “My name is Sunshine. How did you know?”

“But… you’re literally a cloud,” Laser stared at her and she glowered. He thought it might be a good idea to put her down before she had another… static discharge.

“How can I help you, Mr. Laserblast, sir?” Sunshine cleared her throat and shuffled a respectable distance away.

“Is there someplace someone might charge something bigger than a phone?”

“Err… How big?”

“Well, a weapon, for example. A powerful one.”

“Oooh!” The hero’s eyes went star-shaped. “You’re trying to work out where the bazooka from today’s attack on Mr. Claus came from! I heard all about it, you know!”

“Of course,” Laserblast lied smoothly. It hadn’t even occurred to him to pursue that line. “So?”

“I have no idea, sir!” The hero chirped dutifully.

“But. But there must be somewhere? Don’t they sell power banks here?” The cumulus hero shook her head. “Charging stations?” Another shake. “Weapons stores?” Vehement shake. “Where do superheroes charge their weapons around here then?”

“We don’t have any!”

“ _Weapons_?”

“Superheroes. Lakewood is… well, it’s not Neo Riot City, sir.”

“But your town is right next to the Danger Zone! You know, where there’s constant _danger_?”

“That...” the cumulus hero winced a bit and tried hard to be tactful, “...probably has something to do with it, sir. No offense meant, sir.”

The two of them stared at each other.

“Any glorbs?” Laser made one last attempt, deciding that he was desperate enough to pass by his ears the implied slur on super-hero-dom.

“What’s that?” Even the cloudy skirts of the cumulus hero were question-mark-shaped.

“Bright… glowy… orb… thingies?”

“Like… ball-lightning?”

“Alright, why not. Do you have any?”

“Hmm… About once per four years or so, sir, usually in summer.”

Laserblast facepalmed and made an inhuman effort not to prove the young hero right and do something truly evil.

And then he spotted Mr. Claus, leaving very quietly through the back door. Laser couldn’t blame him for wanting a breath of fresh air after the day’s excitement. For some inexplicable reason, the man had been truly devastated to hear that in honest-to-Cob fact, actually, really, _not_ everyone liked Cobsmas, and especially not its personification.

“Sir!” He raised his voice and headed his way. “If you’re going for a walk, I have to come with you.”

“Oh. Ah,” Mr. Claus jumped a little and whirled around. “Ah. Yes. Walk. Do you have to really?”

“I’m here on bodyguard duty. And a villain did attack you only today.”

“Don’t you have...” Mr. Claus looked at him very hard and Laser had the distinct impression he was either trying to start a fight or kiss him. He fervently hoped it was the former. “...anything else to do?”

“Nope,” he lied.

Another very hard, very weird look.

“Er...”

“You didn’t, by any chance, meet any young single parent today with an adorable holiday-spirited little daughter who can teach you the true mean-”

“Aaand off to bed you go, Mr. Claus, big day tomorrow, no time for walkies,” Laser declared heroically, picked up the old man unceremoniously by the scruff and carried him inside.

* * *

Once Mr. Claus was packed off into his PJs and to bed, and his windows bolted and secured, and the alarms turned on, Laser made a beeline for the young cumulus hero.

“You. Change of plan,” he ordered from the threshold of the villa. “Come inside. You’re to stand guard at Mr. Claus’s door and let me know immediately if there is any activity at all.”

“Ok, sir! Thank you for the opportunity, sir! And you, sir? Where will you be?”

“I still need to find a charger for my h- erm, investigation. Of the villain. And his bazooka.”

“I was thinking, sir.”

“Oh, really?”

“Would an industrial charger do? Because if so, then there’s always that factory...”

“What factory?” Laser tried not to get too hopeful.

“It’s just a factory. For… something. Toasters? Car parts, maybe? It’s the biggest industry in Lakewood for now. Although we have some very exciting development projects for civic-”

Laser gave the young hero a bone-crunching pat on the back and was already calling a taxi.

* * *

It dropped him off at a relatively undeveloped zone some way away from the city center. Laser barely managed to set foot outside of the car when it sped back down the road as if all of Cob’s Leaf Beetles were after it.

Promptly, he was knocked to the ground by an explosion and something (someone??) sailed in an arc above his head, among the otherwise idyllic fluffy snowflakes. 

“What in Cob’s popcorn...”

He staggered to his feet just in time to see four little guys make a giant sushi roll out of a buff dude shouting in protest and the thick sheet of snow covering the factory’s wide parking lot. He leaned on the factory sign and wondered if he should help the buff dude, being a hero and all…

And then he saw _him_.

Their gazes met for a magically-charged moment in the muted lamplight dispersed by the ethereal whiteness of the earth, sky and air full of gently falling snow.

“Oh, gimme a break with the Cobsmas spirit already!” Laser shouted at the sky and pinched the bridge of his nose.

He felt grateful that the discharged helmet was now in his backpack because with the lower half of his face covered by the muffler, not a soul on the planet could recognize in him the superhero that had fought, that very same day, the cheeky, bombastic, cute… erm, the villain from the mall.

The villain in question didn’t recognize him or pay him any further attention. He cheered on while the four little guys (“quadruplets,” Laser remembered him saying) heaved and sent the entire buff-guy-and-snow sushi roll rolling over the highway and into the parking lot of the shiny new bodega on its other side. A charred figure scurried from the barbershop next to it and seemed to fret over the giant sushi set.

Still leaning on the sign, Laser watched as the bouncy villain did a victory dance, copied by his kids, lifting each one and tossing them up in the air. One of them started to roll a ball of snow, and in a while, they were all making a buff snowman.

Laser chuckled a bit and for the first time, noticed that the snow was actually very nice, even if it was Cobsmas snow. Fink would have liked to play in it. He could have shown her how to make a snowman, too. He looked down at his boots and gave the nearest tuft of snow a small kick. He'd only had her a couple of months now, but he already missed her so much.

He wondered how the villain managed to raise four kids and, well, be a villain at the same time. Was there a Mrs. Villain to help? Mr. Villain? Mx?

He shook his head and headed back to the more populated areas of Lakewood, rummaging for his phone. He couldn’t ask a _villain_ to charge the very weapon he’d be using to _fight him_ the next day. _Especially_ not at his place. It was ludicrous. He’d just have to make do.

He turned around only once, but this time the parking lot was perfectly empty, and only the glowing sign that read Boxmore showed that someone lived there. He remained all alone on the deserted stretch of snowy highway until his taxi came to pick him up.

* * *

Later that night, Laser curled on one side in his unfamiliar bed, trying to adjust so as not to disturb the healing wound on his shoulder. He touched it gingerly through the bandages and discovered that it was shaped like the letter V. He briefly wondered if that meant anything at all, before he finally drifted off into uneasy sleep. Just two more days, he told himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So our bb Laser doesn't seem to be having the best holidays so far, huh?
> 
> I'd love to receive any words of commiseration for him, or predictions for his mysterious future, or cheese plates of whatever emoji you have on your device of choice. :)


	3. The Spirit of Giving

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! And this is a French Angelfish. They're monogamous and their conservation status is "least concern," which is quite frankly rude. XD
> 
> Enjoy!

♪♪♪ On the second day of Cobsmas, my baby gave to me two blunch meals ♪♪♪

* * *

Who would have thought that only on day two of the whole affair, Laserblast would be so neck-deep in sh… _shenanigans_ that even daydreaming about his beloved hole under the donut shop seemed like a luxury?

“Laserblast, sir?” One of the mayor’s bodyguards approached him. “What are… those?”

“Hm? Heroes, isn’t it obvious?” Laser flashed a heroic smile and winced under his helmet at the sight of a familiar cloud-shaped hero sticking out of a giant fern pot in one corner of Town Hall.

“But what are they doing?”

“Guarding Mr. Claus and your mayor. I arranged them around the whole perimeter. It’s quite a fool-proof network of heroes.” It had to be. Lakewood’s budding heroic community had only one hope of ever being good at anything, in his humble opinion, and that was strength in numbers.

“Isn’t that what you’re here for, sir?” The guard asked and hurriedly added, “no offense meant.”

“Superheroism isn’t about letting one’s ego overshadow the importance of the things we want to protect,” Laser quoted Dr. Greyman shamelessly and gave a heroic and quite, _quite_ strong hug over the neck of the squirming guard. Someone might have called it a headlock, if Laser wasn’t such a great and famous superhero. 

“ _Grhh!_ ”

“This was a wonderful opportunity for me to _involve_ the local _blossoming community_ of young, _bright_ heroes and _include_ them in the _spirit of cooperation_ and _teamwork_.”

“ _Grrrk._ ”

“This is what superheroic _charisma_ is all about, _my fine lad_ , it’s all about leadership and creating a strong team! Didn’t you know?”

He was very proud of himself for that speech. He’d used the c-word without gagging, let the guard go before he passed out, and asserted his superheroic image. Job well done. He was absolutely nailing this. And he felt no excessive aggression whatsoever. None at all.

Next, he smiled and posed and shook hands with the mayor and tried especially hard not to call her, or anyone else, anything corn-related. 

It would have all been tolerable, if it weren’t for the fact that currently, the only thing his helmet was good for was hiding his twitching eye. It was charged all the way to the epic 7%, which was probably good enough for one medium-to-big shot, about three small ones, or charging a football team’s phones. 

How, _how_ could he have been so stupid as to forget he couldn’t charge his helmet the usual way anymore!? He was as good as a crash-test dummy without it. Which he certainly felt like.

“Mr. Claus,” he slithered next to his charge. “Try to wrap up as soon as possible. The villain from yesterday might try again today.”

“Well, that’s what we have you here for, my fine lad!” Mr. Claus said cheerfully and patted his bandaged shoulder.

 _My fine lad_. If the villain didn’t try anything today, Laser felt pretty tempted to do it himself.

“Cobsmas is just around the corner and it wouldn’t do to expose you to too much danger. It’s that magical time of the year when the world needs you the most,” he tried to change tactics and leaned into the cliche, since the old man seemed to like them so much.

Big mistake.

“Oh, I’m so glad you think so!” Mr. Claus beamed beatifically. “But Cobsmas isn’t just about that one day, it’s about the spirit of giving and charity and sharing your time and joy with...”

Laser squeezed his eyes shut behind his visor and tuned him out. What was it with everyone trying to teach him the True Spirit of Cobsmas (TM)!?

He looked around hopefully for his villain. Er. For the villain he had fought yesterday.

No, surely, the villain wouldn’t turn up again. It would be madness. Some measly mall was one thing, but the mayor’s office at Town Hall was another matter altogether. It was well-guarded, there were heroes everywhere and it was a representation of the official authority, and even villains had to live and pay taxes _somewhere_.

“...and incidentally, my good boy, haven’t there been _any_ single parents _at all_ sharing the spirit of giving with you this approaching Cobsmas?”

 _My good boy_ , Laser’s eye twitched again and he wondered if giving Mr. Claus a hug of the variety he had given to that guard earlier would be too much. Eventually, he settled for just silently dragging him towards the area set aside for meeting with the general public at the entrance of Town Hall. The two of them were to be the highlight of the modest Cobsmas fete happening outside, after all. Might as well get on with it.

* * *

And there he was. The villain. He could recognize his green tuft of hair anywhere, even at the back of the crowd, where it kept dipping and reappearing around people’s elbows.

Laser took a deep breath and briefly considered if he might just be there with peaceful intentions, which was, of course, impossible. Then he slithered away from his charge and ducked back into Town Hall and the broom closet where he had stashed his special preparations for just this occasion.

He dearly wished he could have had his helmet charged and they could go at it like yesterday. That had been so much fun. The villain’s dedication to crushing Cobsmas was just… electrifying. But that was villains for you, he supposed, they always got all the fun.

He hurriedly changed into his best civvie clothes and whooshed outside through the side door, almost slipping on the iced stairs in his hurry to get to his position. His plan to sidetrack the enemy was brilliant, really, if a little… _creative_ , and he was very proud of it.

“Jolly Cobsmas, sir!” he shouted at the villain, coming to a screeching stop at the kissing booth he had dug up from the Town Hall storage the same morning. “Would you like to help a goo- er, _charitable_ cause this Cobsmas?”

He wiggled the little bell-and-mistletoe decoration over his unhelmeted head and gave his most devastating, irresistible, flirtatious wink. It had never failed him before. The plan was genius, really.

“What’s a kissing booth, daddy?” someone said from around knee-height, and Laser noticed for the first time that his villain wasn’t alone. Eight… no, wait, _six_!? big, shiny, adorable eyes were looking up at him. 

_Quadruplets_ , he remembered belatedly.

The villain just gave him a blank stare and put a fiver in the donation jar from a safe distance. “Never you mind,” he told his… very shiny and metallic-looking kid. “You’re too young for that sort of thing anyway.”

And he moved on. Just like that.

This did not compute. How… why… 

Laser hurriedly checked his make-up, hair and ruggedly handsome and not-at-all evil stubble in a pocket mirror. He even checked for spinach between his teeth. Nothing. He looked _great_. He would have kissed himself if he were a fest-goer, at even triple the going rate of the booth!

Ah!

It had to be the helmet. Right, right. Some people were really into uniforms and masks and stuff. He sprinted on the double back to the broom closet, to the wide-eyed awe of the cumulus hero now hanging from a tree, and back to the booth in full heroic getup this time.

“Sir! What about now!?” He huffed, out of breath.

The cute round villain just gave him a confused look over his shoulder while wiping cotton candy off one kid’s face.

“Wow, you’re really desperate, aren’t you?” He commented, looking unimpressed.

“I’m sorry!?” _What! How!? How dare he! Nobody in his entire life had ever called him desperate! He was cool! And suave! So very suave!_

“What charitable cause is it anyway that needs money so badly?” The villain trotted over and read the cardboard sign. “Save the… _French Angelfish_?”

Hero and villain stared at each other. Laser had _not_ checked what the cause was beforehand.

Then the villain huffed and started laughing. Laser, to whom the absurdity of the situation finally started to dawn, first hiccupped, and then started laughing, too. The release of tension was almost as good as it had been during the fight yesterday, and he let himself go.

“What does the cause matter? ‘Tis the season of giving, didn’t you hear?” He imitated Mr. Claus through chuckles. “Do you like fish?”

“I do, as a matter of fact. I like deep-sea fish the most,” the villain volunteered and after some rummaging through pockets, added another fiver to the jar. “Did you know that French Angelfish mate for life?”

“Yeah,” he nodded, surprised. “My MS is in Marine Biology.”

“Really?” The villain’s eyebrows shot up and he looked genuinely interested, which was rare enough a response to the words ‘marine biology.’ “Aw, now I wish I had brought one of my junkfish robots today. I model them after anglerfish. You would have liked them, they’ve very anatomically correct.”

“Oh. So your factory makes _robots_?” The info clicked in his head.

“Yeah! And my MS is in robotics and engineering.”

Someone coughed very pointedly behind him, and for the first time, Laser realized there was a whole giant waiting line that had formed behind the villain, probably as soon as he’d appeared in his hero getup.

“Er,” the villain commented, one snaggle-tooth making an appearance ( _Oh, Cob, so cute!_ ). “Well, you look busy. I suppose I’d better let you get back to it then. Those amorous angelfish won’t save themselves. Come on, kiddos.”

“Ah, no! Wait! I- _mmpf_!”

Laser found his cheeks firmly squished and a solid kiss aimed right at him, which he only managed to dodge in the last moment, due to years and years of heroically trained reflexes.

* * *

The tiny ‘Save the French Angelfish Foundation’, consisting of three enthusiastic exchange students with a donation page, was visited by a genuine Cobsmas miracle a few days later, when a massive donation made out in the name of “the horny township of Lakewood” arrived at their doorstep. 

* * *

There was nothing to worry about, Laser was convinced when he finally managed to extract himself from the booth and made it back to Mr. Claus’s side. The villain had not been carrying any weapons, nor had he had any place to conceal them. The Town Hall and plaza were teeming with heroes. Plus, the guy had seemed… very pleasant, actually. Not at all like the maniac from the previous day who had attacked with that big, shiny, impressive bazooka of his. It was all going to be fine, he decided optimistically.

“I am so glad that you’re getting into the spirit of giving, my lad!” Mr. Claus greeted him. “Supporting a charity is exactly the thing that the true spirit of Cobsmas is all about. Let me tell you the heart-warming story of-”

Laser kicked the small podium from under Mr. Claus’s feet and heroically caught him.

“Oops, watch out there, Mr. Claus, these things can be slippery in winter,” he chirped.

“Ah-haaah! Finally you two are together!” Someone shouted. “Put him down, you hero! He belongs to ME this time!!”

Laser peeked over the fluffy white hair of Mr. Claus, who was suddenly hugging him like a blushing bride, and beheld his cute round villain, who was pointing at the two of them.

“You and what army?” Laser smirked, his pulse not at all picking up in anticipation. He’d hoped to distract the villain and avoid a battle, his helmet’s charge being depleted and all, but hey, who was he to turn down a good fight when one was so very clearly unavoidable?

“Hand him over this instant, and you’ll be spared!!” the villain demanded.

“Come and get it, then,” Laser leered. At the suddenly very shiny look he got from Mr. Claus, he added, “Er. Him, I mean. Come and get him.”

“Excuse me!” Mr. Claus interjected excitedly. “I say, excuse me! My good villain, do you happen to be the single parent of those adorable and no doubt holiday-spir-”

Laser chucked Mr. Claus over his shoulder at the startled cloudy hero Sunshine and leaped at the villain. They were both without weapons, and Laser was pretty confident he could win when the playing field was even. 

That’s why it came as a terrible surprise to him when the villain caught him mid-leap as if he weighed nothing, and then tossed him aside like… like… a _doll_...

“Wut the-”

The villain gave a battle cry, ripped off his shirt, tying his necktie around his head like a bandana in the process, and in several mind-boggling, swift motions disassembled the four robotic kids that had been clinging to his pant legs and assembled an honest-to-Cob _cannon_ out of them.

That knocked the air out of Laser’s lungs more effectively than landing on top of the corndog stall had managed to do. It was… wow… where had that _been_ his whole life!? That drive? That flare? Those manboobs!?

“Oh, my,” Laser purred and all but drooled, still perched on the ruins of the corndog stand. “What a great big gun you’ve got there...”

The villain stared at him like an affronted owl and inched away, cannon held between them, just in case.

 _No, no, no, wait!_ This wasn’t supposed to work like that, Cob dang it! _He_ was the one who was supposed to have that effect on _others_ , not the other way around!

“B-by which I mean,” Laser waved his hands in panic, “it’s very impress-” He bit his tongue, cursing himself mentally. “I mean, cease and desist, _villain_!”

The villain shot him.

Laser barely managed to duck and crouch behind the crepe vendor’s van. It occurred to him for the first time that without his powers, he was little more than flesh and blood facing off against a cobsdanged plasma cannon. His only bet was to keep the villain talking while one of the other heroes managed to get Mr. Claus to safety. He took a look at the positions of the other heroes. 

None of them had moved an inch. In fact, they seemed to be making videos.

“Honestly, I don’t know what else I expected,” he growled to himself and then shouted, “Hey, villain! Why do you want Mr. Claus anyway?”

“If there is no Mr. Claus, there is no Cobsmas! I hate Cobsmas!” The villain jumped out in front of him and aimed the cannon at him again. “And I hate heroes! And I especially hate heroes who love Cobsmas! Disgusting, the whole lot of you, with your _friendship_ and your _True Spirit of Whatever_!”

“Honestly? If you promise not to hurt him, you can have him, for all I care,” Laser said quite sincerely, bedazzled by the pecs on a generous display right in front of his face. 

Cob, was that what his looks did to other people, too? Devastating. Maybe there was something to that whole c-word, after all, he mused, now staring at a tiny, adorable belly-button, just perfect for dipping his...

In the next moment, he was staring down a cannon muzzle which almost sobered him up.

“What kind of ploy is that, big city slicker?” The villain sounded suspicious. “There’s no way a superhero like you would just give up protecting that horrible little personification of Cobsmas.”

“Can’t a hero hate Cobsmas?” Laser’s voice echoed down the cannon’s barrel, which he could swear was blinking at him. Like, with actual eyes.

“Why would you?” The villain lowered the cannon and glowered at him.

“Well, why would _you_?” Laser asked and realized he actually genuinely wanted to know.

“Ah-hah!” His bouncy villain shouted and jumped back, waving an accusatory finger at him. “You’re hoping to lure me into giving you my villainous monologue now, before I have my target, and use my distraction to escape!”

“I’m not going anywhere, babe,” he spread his arms to indicate that he was quite comfortably lounging down in his best and sluttiest casual pose #08-A ‘Oh, no, I’m pressed into a corner, _whatever_ shall I do?’

He did it out of habit, and remembered too late how his villain took to that sort of thing.

The villain shot him again.

“Ok, ok, I’m sorry about the babe! I apologize!” He shouted, barely managing to escape the shot and scutter away on all fours.

“Now you’ve really made me angry, _hero_!” the villain also shouted and ran after him. “Feel my wrath! Or something!”

He pointed his cannon at him again and charged, and Laser realized with dawning horror that not only had the local heroes not gotten Mr. Claus to safety, but he was still very much in his place right behind the overturned podium, right in the middle of an open field, a sitting bearded duck for anyone with a cannon. He had no choice but to leap between him and the villain, and hope for the best.

He reached for his helmet and turned it on. Against a cannon like that, he had only one shot, and if he missed…

For a supercharged, unnaturally drawn moment, Laser and his villain faced off, cannon and helmet rapidly charging in the middle of the incongruously idyllic Cobsmas fete, inside a circle of wide-eyed innocent bystanders.

And then came the whine.

“Daddyyyyy! This plasma is too hoooot! I can’t keep shooting!”

“Daddy, me too! I don’t wanna be a cannon anymooooore!”

“I want mowe cotton-candy, daddyyyyy!”

“I am Jethro!”

Right in front of the baffled Laser, the villain’s cannon disassembled itself back into four whining, crying toddlers, who scattered on the ground and then latched onto their daddy’s shins.

“Oh, _poop_ ,” said the villain expressively and deflated in resignation. Then he leaned down and picked them up. “How many times did I tell you that this one is important for daddy! Darrell, plasma is supposed to be hot! It won’t hurt you. I’d know, I made you!”

Laser almost jumped out of his skin when the villain glared and pointed at him next.

“I have to withdraw for today, _hero_ , but I’ll be back! You were given another chance to surrender, don’t waste it this time!”

And he turned on his heels and left. Just like that. Laser stared after him, bug-eyed behind the helmet’s visor. Cob, he needed a cherry sucker.

“Well… I suppose that was one way to channel the spirit of giving this holiday,” Mr. Claus intoned behind him, trotting over.

“Well, I do wanna give it to him hard, that’s for sure,” Laser mumbled under his breath as he picked a random lollipop from the nearest booth and popped it into his mouth. 

Upon the horrible realization that Mr. Claus had excellent hearing despite his age, as reflected on his pink-cheeked, starry-eyed, absolutely-not-snickering face, Laser almost swallowed the lollipop, stick and all. 

“By which I mean, I want to fight him! In a fight! Make him submit to m-” Mr. Claus’s face grew five shades pinker and his absolutely-not-grin - twice as wide. 

“Aah, cobble this,” a red-faced Laser growled. “You won’t get off my back anyway, will you.”

* * *

It occurred to Laser, as he snuck through the back door of the rented villa in his civvie clothes and helmet in his backpack, that as far as bodyguarding duty went, he probably wasn’t doing the most stellar job possible. Once again, he had managed to drag Mr. Claus home, despite his constant attempts to either impart tales of the Spirit of Cobsmas (TM) on him or wander off after a cute baby or a quaint Cobsmas decoration. And once again, he had stuck the unfortunate cumulus hero on guard duty.

“I just don't know what to make of him, Sparks,” he mumbled into his earphones’ mic from inside his muffler. “He was… perfectly sane when I talked to him at the kis, er, _kiosk_. Yes, he knew it was me, I was in uniform. And then, in the next moment, he was assembling a cobsdanged cannon and shooting at me.”

He ran to the street while Carol covertly tried to discourage him from confronting the villain directly. Of course, he had no intention of listening to her.

“Anyhow, how’s Fink doing?” He rolled his eyes at the reply. “No, Sparks, of course I don’t need backup. He may be slightly… unconventional, but I think I can take one dude with a cannon. I lost my powers, not the last fifteen years of training Foxtail’s put me through.”

His taxi came mercifully quickly, but not quickly enough.

“Sparks!” He barked and slammed its door harder than it was necessary. “Enough. I got it, you think I’m too weak to tie my shoelaces. I got it, alright?” he hissed venomously. “No need to rub it in every time we talk, for Cob’s sake! Just tell me how Fink is doing.”

This time it was her turn to hang up on him. It was probably for the best, he thought darkly as he gave the taxi driver the address. He was getting tired of being the bad guy in their… whatever that was, now. He really should have stayed in his glorious hole under the donut shop, he thought longingly.

* * *

His mood was foul enough when he arrived at Boxmore that he didn’t even hesitate to let himself into the giant booming hall of the factory. How bad could it be? The guy had seemed nice enough when he was playing with his… kids, or talking about fish. And in fact, he knew a tiny part of him actually wouldn’t mind if the villain came at him. So far, he had proven to be the best distraction Laser had had in… forever, actually.

“Hey!” he raised his voice over the humming of the mysterious factory machines. “Anyone home?”

“Hewwo.”

He looked down to see a… purple sphere latch itself to his boot and one adorable eye looked soulfully up at him. He recognized one of the villain’s kids. After seeing them turned into a cannon, he wasn’t entirely sure what to make of them.

“Hi, little guy. Is your daddy here?”

The little guy stared at him even more adorably than before, if that was at all possible, and then gently proceeded to open a mouth of terrifying proportions right across his midsection and chomp on Laser’s boot with gusto.

“Right,” he concluded. If it weren’t for the strong metal bands encircling the boot, he might have very well lost a limb, he thought distractedly as he lifted his foot and stared at the little monstrosity trying to chew through it. It was kind of cute.

He boldly stomped on, accessorized by one purple baby bot now, and decided that if the owner of the factory wasn’t there, he could help himself to any convenient charging stations lying around.

That one for example. It looked just like one of the big public chargers that…

The charger grew tracks and rolled away.

Laser hopped after it.

“I am Jethro!” the charger announced indignantly and hid under a conveyor belt. 

Laser stuck his accessorized boot under the belt and when Jethro came out the other side, he trapped him under an empty cardboard box.

“I got you now,” he said with more satisfaction that was probably befitting an adult and pulled the box to himself. “Let’s see what you are and if you bite.”

He stuck his other boot in the box and when nothing bit into it, he reached in and took Jethro out.

“Hey, there buddy. I’m Laser. I don’t suppose you know where the chargers are around here? They look… well, kind of like you.”

Jethro looked at him adorably and popped an empty battery in his hand.

“Erm. Right. I guess I can feed you, while I’m at it,” he said and put the baby bot in his coat pocket. “Now-”

“Let our Jethro go, you hero!” two shrill voices shouted and before he knew it, there was one jaw latched onto the leather patch on his coat’s elbow and another - onto its shoulder pad. The one on the shoulder was a bit too close to his wound, and he couldn’t help wincing.

“Wow, you’re so ferocious,” he said, impressed. “Whatever shall I do in the face of such a vicious attack? Wait, I know! How about this?”

He reached out and tickled the red bot on his shoulder, who started making stifled noises and eventually fell off, giggling. Laser caught it just in time, stuck it in his other pocket and buttoned it.

“You’ve been bagged! Er, pocketed! Stay there and think about your behavior, young evildoer,” he said heroically and bopped the nose of the baby bot poking its head from his pocket. It giggled.

“And now for you...” He reached out to the orange one hanging off his elbow, but it growled at him. So he prudently used the fluffy fringe of his muffler to tickle its nose until the bot gave a cute little sneeze and fell off. In the process, it managed to bite into the muffler.

“Wow, you remind me of my Fink. She also bites everything that moves,” he said to the growling bot hanging off his muffler and proceeded to lower it into his last, inner pocket and button it, too.

“Alright, so I feed you some batteries now, and then you show me the chargers, alright?”

* * *

Laser didn’t have the first idea how, half an hour later, he found himself on the floor of a kids’ playroom, feeding batteries to baby bots and playing “wreck the lego bodega” with them. It certainly felt less like babysitting than his main job did, at least.

And then, there was a whistling sound, and a crash, and one cute round villain butt collided with his face.

* * *

“Hey! Hey, big city slicker! Are you alive?” Someone was shaking him. “I refuse to be held responsible if you croak on my property!”

“Whaa...” he said intelligently and managed to open his eyes. Someone splashed a glass of water in his face.

“Thank you, Darrell. Very thoughtful. So? Alive?”

Laser propped himself on his elbows and tried to collect his scattered thoughts. The world spun gently.

“You have a very soft butt,” he replied intelligently.

“Aaand out you go,” the villain said and swung back a toy baseball bat.

“No, no, wait!” Laser waved his hands. “I’m concussed! Probably! Give me a minute.”

“Why were you in my kids’ room?” The villain lowered the bat and eyed him suspiciously. “Granted, they seem well-fed and they did need a baby-sitter, but where did you come from?”

“Where did _you_ come from, for that matter?” Laser furrowed his brows at the hole in the ceiling where the soft butt had attacked him from. “Is this normal for you?”

“Oh, I was just over there at the bodega, fighting that stupid, beefy, annoying bodegaman and his _pal_ Mr. Logic.” The villain explained matter-of-factly. “He’s going for that broody tragic hero look these days, it’s disgusting.”

“What happened to him?” Laser remembered the beefy sushi he’d seen the previous day. That hadn’t seemed particularly tragic or heroic to him.

“Ugh, something about the love of his life choosing someone else, and him getting falsely accused and sacked over something that happened to her boytoy or something. It’s all very shmoopy.”

Laser had the vague impression that the story should have rung some bell, but nothing came to mind. The villain was probably right and it was the plot of some famous TV show or something. He cleared his throat and went back on topic.

“I came to talk to you. About Mr. Claus.”

“What about him?”

“Well, we can’t carry on like this, can we? You attacking, and me striking back. There has to be some way to settle this peacefully. Is there anything in particular that you want?”

“I thought you heroic big city types didn’t negotiate with villains,” the villain glared with supreme suspicion.

“I know this sounds like a huge cliche, but I seem not to be like other heroes,” Laser said with some bitterness seeping into his voice as he sat cross-legged on the floor and faced the villain.

“Well, there’s nothing you can do about it. I want Cobsmas _gone_ , ruined, banned forever! And your beloved Mr. Claus is its embodiment!”

“He’s not my anything,” Laser hissed. “But I can’t let you harm him.”

“Why? If you don't care about him...”

“Because I’m a hero. It’s what we do.”

“What’s your name, hero?” the villain asked after a small pause.

“Laserblast,” he answered hesitantly. It had been quite some time since he’d met anyone who didn’t know him on sight, and he wasn’t sure how to feel about it now. “Call me Laser.”

“I’m Boxman,” the villain said brightly and extended a hand. After a beat, Laser took it. “So I guess that makes us sworn enemies for the foreseeable future! That’s exciting! You’re my first Neo Riot City hero! You’re from NRC, right?”

“Yes. Erm. Pleasure’s mine?” he managed. He was aware that fighting him was a certain status symbol among NRC villains, but he’d never met one who was so… cheerfully delighted to be ‘sworn enemies’ with him. Especially one who didn’t seem to know him to begin with.

“So, can I help you with anything else for our impending mighty clash?” the villain, _Boxman_ , asked hopefully. “Seeing that you helped babysit my kids while I was busy fighting those other nasty heroes?”

“Help me?” Laser blinked in confusion. “You’ve been shooting cannons at me for the past two days. Shouldn’t you try to… I don’t know, drop a bomb on my head and be done with it?”

“Why would I want to do that?” Boxman’s cute snaggletooth made an appearance. 

“Well… I mean… heroes, villains, trying to vanquish one another, sort of thing..?”

“I’m more about the classical back and forth of evil, you know. Sustainable villainy, if you will.” Boxman explained cheerfully. “I don’t approve of all that total destruction and annihilation villains these days are getting into. I mean, if I off you today, who am I going to fight tomorrow? Look at you.” And he patted him like he was appraising a car. “It’d be a waste of a perfectly good hero with decades of antagonism left in him!”

Laser stared. Boxman stared back in the polite expectation of a gracious host.

“Right. Well,” Laser coughed and tried to collect himself. Where was all this pink sparkling light coming from? “Now that you mention it...” he threw a surreptitious look at his backpack and wondered if he was out of his mind, or Boxman was, or the world in general. “Do you think I can charge my helmet at your place?”

“Sure!” Boxman hopped to his feet. “Just let me see it. Lakewood’s power grid sucks lemons, what you want is glorbs! They’re the future, I tell you!”

“You do glorb research?” Laser’s eyes went wide.

“Yeah! Wanna read my articles? They’re great, if I can say so myself! Brilliant!”

Boxman easily found a charger for the helmet and plugged it into a giant industrial glorb storage downstairs while chattering about his research and how hard it was for an independent genius to get his work published in respectable evil scientific journals. Laser commiserated distractedly, while taking in the emotionally painful sight of the glorbs.

“Sooo...” Boxman stepped from foot to foot adorably and looked up at him with just the cutest tiny blush. “It’ll be a while before it’s charged. I was going to have dinner...”

“Oh. Sorry. Yeah,” Laser pulled himself to the present. “I don’t want to bother you, I’ll, er, I’ll go wait in the bodega or something...”

“In the bodega?” Boxman growled. “Oh, no you won’t! I don’t want you teaming up with my other nemeses. Just stay for dinner! I’ll make my famous blunch! It’s great!”

“Won’t Mrs. Boxman mind?” Laser’s libido supplied smoothly before his brain could intervene. 

“Why would my mom mind?” Boxman’s cute snaggletooth cropped up once again. “Plus, she lives all the way in Townsburg.”

“I meant the kids’ other parent.”

“Oh. There’s nobody else. It’s just us five here.”

“Cool, cool. Lead the way. I’m starving,” Laser said with way too much enthusiasm.

* * *

And that was how, the same evening, he found himself back home with a fully-charged helmet, a belly full of home-cooked unidentifiable stuff, and two boxed blunches, which he had scored after Boxman learned with horror that he and Mr. Claus were living off fancy takeaway. 

As he got out of his taxi, he had spotted the old man going out on a walk all by himself just as he was going home, and had grabbed him and taken him home. He had even been in a good enough mood to invite him to one of the blunches, but Mr. Claus had refused. Well, it was his loss, Laser decided.

The two neatly packed tupperware containers were the last thing he looked at before he drifted off to sleep, feeling slightly more optimistic about his future than he had in a long time. Maybe his last day in the quaint, Cobsmas-spirited Lakewood wouldn’t be as bad as all that, he thought.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So our bb Laser seems to have met his domestic, soft-butted match, eh? 
> 
> I'd love to hear some opinions about how awesome our bb Boxy is, or about Laser's sparkling flirting skills, or about Mr. Claus's shipping tastes. XD Or about your day, that also works!


	4. The Spirit of Brotherhood and Mutual Help

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For this chapter, have a pic of the baby bots. I know you remember them, I just think they're cute.
> 
> Enjoy!

♪♪♪ On the third day of Cobsmas, my baby gave to me three blankets ♪♪♪

* * *

It was the last day of Mr. Claus bodyguard duty, and Laser had not actively fantasized about any deep, cosy holes for over 12 glorious hours (at least, not of the sewer-under-a-donut-shop variety anyway). With his helmet fully charged and a rather good idea who his “sworn enemy” was and what he was likely to do, he was ready to take on the whole world. He felt that his ardent desire for the villain… that is to say, _to fight the villain_ , was exceptionally heroic and appropriate. Occasionally, life was good.

“With only a few days left until Cobsmas, ‘tis time to remember the True Spirit of the Holidays, of brotherhood and mutual help, ho-ho-ho,” Mr. Claus preached next to him, in yet another glorified booth, this time in The Better Lakewood Mall. Having two whole malls was, apparently, a source of immense civic pride, and Dr. Greyman had told him in no uncertain terms that visiting only one of them would be a major moral failing on both his and Mr. Claus’s part. So there they were.

But even that couldn’t spoil Laser’s mood. Plus, the old man hadn’t asked a single time today if he’d already met any single parents of holiday-spirited little kids who could show him… something or another. 

Apropos of nothing at all, what was taking Boxman so long, he wondered, surveying the crowd heroically.

And then a small evil boot kicked him from behind with enough force to throw him over the booth table, and one Boxman swung on the countertop, bazooka already in hand.

“Surrender now, hero!” he announced off the top of his voice. “Hand over your charge now, so the world may be rid of Cobsmas once and for all!”

“Never,” Laser announced equally passionately as he tried to discreetly rub his hurting butt. “The world needs Mr. Claus, so that the True Spirit of...” _Wait, what was it that people needed him for, again?_

“Brotherhood and mutual help, my good lad!” Mr. Claus shout-whispered from a safe distance away.

“Right! So that the True Spirit of Brotherhood and Mutual Help may prevail!”

“Nevah,” Boxman cackled evilly and loaded the bazooka, looking straight into Laser’s visor.

Laser grinned back like a maniac and shot first. 

* * *

The fight had been just as exhilarating as the first time they’d crossed paths, and was probably going to cost this mall in repairs as much as it had cost the other one. Equality above all!

This time, though, Laser didn’t let the surprisingly spry villain bounce away like the last two times. No, this time, he had him pressed hard against the wall, his short stubby legs scraping for purchase against Laser’s muscular thighs, and his mismatched hands in the hero’s vice-like grip. They were both sweaty, breathing hard and grinning at each other like sharks, but Laser had him right where he wanted him, no mistake about it, and had his weapon pressed right against Boxman’s forehead.

His weapon, of course, being his helmet.

Cob, Boxy’s lips looked just as plump as the rest of him, this up close.

It suddenly occurred to Laserblast that the oooh-ing and aaah-ing mall crowd around them taking pictures and making videos might not be interpreting correctly the heroism of the moment.

He growled in frustration and leaped back from his villain. In the split moment it took Boxman to find his feet and get ready to retaliate, Laser managed to grab the bazooka that had been lying discarded nearby. He pointed it at its owner, from a more decorous distance this time.

“Give it up, villain. Mr. Claus will never become yours.”

The crowd giggled loudly.

“Oh, SHUT UP!” Boxman screamed at them. “Leave my nemesis alone, you know very well what he meant!”

Laser blinked in blushy confusion behind his visor at this display of nemesial chivalry.

Boxman blinked, too. “Wait,” he said quickly and looked around. “Where _is_ Mr. Claus?”

“If you think I can be distracted so easily,” Laser began and shifted the weight of the bazooka. It was monstrously heavy, and he had no idea how Boxman had been swinging it around so easily, even with his strong, muscular arms that…

“No, seriously, where is he?” Boxman waved his fists around in frustration. “Did your hero pals hide him!? Not fair! This was supposed to be between the two of us! This is what ‘nemesis’ means, ya know,” he lectured him.

Laser risked a glance around and did not spot anywhere the bushy white hairdo. He looked at the cumulus hero, Sunshine, who was apparently making a video on her phone in the sidelines, but she just shrugged an expressive ‘dunno’ and went on filming.

“Mr. Claus?” He shouted above the din of the crowd, but there was no reply.

“What?!” Boxman trotted over, steaming with indignation. “Don’t give me that innocent act, hero! What did you do to him?”

“I haven’t done anything!” Laser barked back, finally dropping the danged heavy bazooka. “Why would I bring him to the mall in the first place, if I was going to magic him away!”

“Then your hero friends did it!”

“They’re not my friends! And they’re so incompetent they couldn’t hide a tree in a forest!”

“MAYBE SO, BUT _HEY_ ,” shouted probably a third of the crowd. Lakewood had an unusually dense heroic population. In both senses of the word.

“Oh, great. Just great,” Boxman threw his hands in the air. “That’s what you get for trusting a big city slicker to do _anything_ right, Boxy. Gimme that!”

He grabbed his bazooka with indignation and impressive ease, swung it on his shoulder, huffed something corn-related under his breath, and stomped away.

“Wait! Where are you going?”

“To find Mr. Claus, of course!” Boxman shouted over his shoulder. “Wherever you’ve stashed him!”

“For the last time, I didn’t!” Laser shouted back. “I’m a hero! You’re supposed to believe me!”

Boxman turned around, blew the most impressive raspberry Laser had ever seen, including Fink, and stormed away without another word. The crowd parted to let him proceed to the mall’s Cobsmas display, where a few part-time elves were being molested by four small, very metallic-looking kids, under the supervision of an also part-time Santa.

“And what are we going to do, sir?” Sunshine slithered over and asked, while very visibly sending videos to a lot of chats on her phone. 

Oh, goodie. POINT PR was going to have a field day with that one. Just what he needed.

“Organize and search the mall, of course!” he barked and stormed off in the opposite direction to Boxman.

As if things couldn’t get any worse, the crowd, feeling that one main attraction was over, swarmed around him for autographs, photos, handshakes, and apparently, butt pinches. Just what he was in the mood to provide, great. Juuust great.

* * *

“Can my baby wear your helmet for the next photo, Mister Laserblast?”

“Not unless you want them to become the youngest mass-murderer in history, ma’am.”

“Sir! Mister Laserblast sir, help me! I was robbed just now! I was bonked on the head right at my part-time workplace, and my uniform was stolen, and now there’s an impostor in my place! Help!”

“That is a _very_ elaborate metaphor for being laid off, and I urge you to look for professional help, sir. Good luck.”

“But no, I...”

“Laserblast, you’re my hero! I’ve modeled my entire heroic career around you, sir! You’re the best!”

“Yes, I’m a cobsdanged lollipop, my good ma… natee? Keep at it.”

* * *

As much of a reluctant bodyguard and Cobsmas-worshipper as he was, Laser had been a hero practically his whole conscious life and knew his options. After the search of the mall didn’t turn up anything more than dozens of people who were _very_ eager to be frisked (and a couple who went straight into strip-search territory as soon as they spotted him), he started _delegating_. 

Laserblast could, on occasion, generously tolerate and even approve of teamwork, provided that _someone else_ was in a team and doing the work. Plus, he could always heroically crop up in the last possible moment with Dramatic Timing (™), have a good, straightforward fight, and steal the day. Superheroism had its perks.

So the mayor was contacted to let her know what had happened in her very own town, the meager list of hotels, hospitals, shelters and rental agencies was rung up and supplied with an assigned local hero ‘liaison’, the young cumulus hero Sunshine was hastily promoted to ‘special deputy for coordination’, and Laser’s number was distributed to everyone with clear instructions to contact him if anything like a ransom demand or credible anonymous tip came in.

All that was left to do was wait. 

Which Laser wasn’t very good at. He was a man of action, after all.

That is how less than two hours after losing Mr. Claus to forces unknown, Laser found himself sneaking through the back entrance of Boxmore, carefully noting the location of the security cameras. He did _not_ trust villains or their word just because they happened to be cute. So very cute.

* * *

Lord Boxman did _not_ trust heroes either, of any description. He had more reasons than most not to trust them, and a certain big city slicker seemed even less trustworthy than most.

That is how less than two hours after losing Mr. Claus to forces unknown, and dropping his kids back home, Boxman found himself sneaking through the back entrance of a certain rented villa, carefully noting the location of the couple of ambling local heroes left on guard duty.

He had outmaneuvered them so well, and without even leaving any footprints in the parts of the yard where there was fresh snow, and was so busy patting himself on the back that he completely missed the pair of cute storm-themed boots by the door.

He took a quick look at the kitchen, living room and other spaces on the first floor and headed to the second floor, where the bedrooms had to be. The first one he entered contained just some very neatly folded clothes, a few toiletries, a few pairs of silky red undies (which Boxman examined at a distance and with great mistrust) and for some reason, a box of cherry suckers. Boxman checked them suspiciously and nicked the box, on principle.

That only left what looked like the master bedroom. Boxman boldly threw the door open, someone shrieked, and exactly one second later he fell in a well-sautéed heap on the floor.

“Mister Laserblast, sir, I think I killed a villain, sir, what do I do!?” a vision of stormy skies with golden earrings was squeaking on the phone when he came to.

“No you didn’t,” he mumbled.

“Oh. Maybe I didn’t. _Should I_?”

Boxman could hear the empathetic “oh for Cob’s sake, of course not” from the other side of the line and decided that he didn’t dislike that _one_ hero all that much, after all.

“But Mister Laserblast sir, what if he kidnapped Mr. Claus?!” She winced. “No, I suppose he wouldn’t be sneaking around here then… Alright sir. Yes, sir. I will sir.” She rolled her eyes. “I _won’t_ , sir.”

* * *

When he heard the commotion in the parking lot, Laser was lying on his belly in the baby bots’ playroom, contentedly finishing a lollipop meant for them that he’d found on a high shelf, and showing the starry-eyed kids how to draw with crayons different kinds of bombs. His helmet was placidly charging downstairs, and really, one place to wait for news was as good as another, right?

Plus, the bots were more interesting than sitting around watching the local heroes fumble and fail anyway. So far, Darrell had drawn a dress on his bomb, the orange one who wouldn’t give its name had eaten three crayons, the purple one had drawn a very technologically correct hand-grenade and Jethro had made a tutu of the paper and had started to dance, probably. 

And yet, it still felt less like baby-sitting than bodyguarding the notorious Mr. Claus had felt. Laser absently thought about what Fink must be doing, since she’d never gone this long without seeing him… He probably should look into finding her more friends her age to play with, he mused.

“YOU!” Boxman burst through the door and pointed a furious finger at him. “As if grabbing Mr. Claus from under my very nose wasn’t enough of a humiliation, you made your hero pals drag me back here like some sort of takeout delivery!”

“I didn’t, they’re not, and I only asked them to give you a ride back here peacefully,” he said and sat up cross-legged, taking in the sight of a slightly singed Boxman with slightly ripped clothes. He couldn’t help noting that unfortunately, they still covered him up pretty well. “So, did you find Mr. Claus at my place?”

“No,” a fluffed-up Boxman admitted after some pouting.

“Yeah,” Laser nodded in contemplation. “I didn’t find him at yours either.”

“What, you managed to ransack the whole factory while I was gone?” Boxman looked reluctantly impressed.

“Nope. I just asked this smart little guy to show me your security camera feeds,” Laser grinned and lifted up the purple bot. “Does this one have a name? It won’t say.”

“Ernesto,” Boxman said and finally took a more careful look at the peaceful domestic scene. “Huh. You do get along with them, don’t you.”

“I like playing with kids. Plus, I have one at home. Her name’s Fink.”

“Oh,” Boxman’s eyes widened and then he seemed to fluff up a bit. “The newspapers didn’t mention _that_ bit of info.”

“Finally looked me up, huh?” Laser asked with forced casualness. For some reason, he didn’t like it at all that Boxman had seen what the media had to say about him, even if they had never actually said anything bad. He’d been very careful about that. And yet, part of him felt… cheated.

“Yup. They made you out to be _the_ big city slicker. I wouldn’t have thought that someone like that would come to Lakewood, and on Cobsmas, no less.”

“Well, the newspapers don’t know everything,” Laser spat out and looked away. “In fact, they know _nothing_.”

“They will know soon enough that you lost Mr. Claus, for one,” Boxman supplied helpfully. “We have this annoying young reporter Dynamite What’s-her-face who fancies herself the next Pulitzer, and I saw her lurking in the mall crowd today.”

“Oh, Cob’s cobnuts,” was Laser’s succinct commentary.

“Weeellll,” Boxman drawled and poked his fingers together. “Shouldn’t you be doing something… I don’t know, heroic, about it? Normally, I would have expected righteous fury and a lot of heroic speeches about restoring the personification of Cobsmas or something.”

“I’m more of the strong silent type, didn’t you hear,” Laser replied bitterly. “I already gave whatever orders I had to the local heroes. Plus, I hate Cobsmas. You know that.”

“Why aren’t you at least calling your teammates?” Boxman cocked his head with curiosity. “The local heroes won’t be of much help, let me tell you. Your assessment of them was very on point,” he snickered a bit.

“They have their own Cobsmas gigs. Plus, if I need someone to tell me how badly I screwed up, I don’t need them. I can do that all by myself.” 

His phone started ringing, so he patted all the baby bots one last time and finally got up, not looking at Boxman.

“Don’t worry, my helmet will be charged very soon, and then I’ll be out of your hair. Sorry for sneaking in.”

“Oh,” Boxman said.

Laser didn’t look at him and just headed for the door. The day that had started so well was a flaming disaster, and it was all his fault, once again, somehow, for some reason. And now he had to don the bloody helmet and the heroic presence once more and go team up with some people he disliked in order to find the personification of something he hated, so that other people he had never met could have a great happy holiday while he himself felt at his lowest ever. Heroism was really great. The best.

“Hey!” Boxman called after him. When Laser ignored him, he hopped after him and grabbed the door just as he was about to close it. “Are you alright?”

Laser’s eyes went wide. Then he realized Boxman must be talking about the wound on his shoulder. He had felt it reopen during the fight and bleed some, but he had not had time to do anything about it.

“Yeah. I’ll just slap a new bandage on. I’ve had a lot worse.”

“What?” Boxman blinked. “No, I meant like… are you _alright_?”

Laser looked at the concerned mismatched eyes for a long, long moment, trying to hold in all the things that were surging to be said to someone, anyone who’d listen without telling him it was fine.

“Yeah, superheroes are always alright,” he summarized, avoiding Boxman’s eyes. “Now I really have to take this,” he added and showed his phone.

* * *

“I’ve been WHUOAT,” came the bellow from downstairs before Boxman had even had time to put away the crayons and paper the baby bots had been using and tidy the room. He winced and trotted out, baby bots in tow, to find a furious-looking Laser holding his phone in a grip so strong it had cracked the screen.

“Erm. Everything alright down there?” Boxman called from the second-floor ramp.

“They… they _evicted_ me,” Laser said, still staring at his phone in disbelieving ire.

“What, your teammates?!”

“No! The villa that we had booked for the stay! They said they have another celeb booked for tonight and that I have to scram.”

“I guess you’ll really be out there _in the streets_ keeping the peace and all,” Boxman unsuccessfully stifled a loud snicker.

Laser chucked his phone at him, but of course, missed by a wide margin. The phone plopped into a glorb cylinder vat and floated back down to Laser’s eye level, as if mocking him. Then, to add insult to injury, it started randomly playing a Cobsmas tune muted by the glorb liquid. 

He screamed at the universe.

“So, when were you going to tell me that you’re only here for three days, _hero_?” Boxman leered. “Hoped to scutter off in secret, eh?”

“Me?! _You’re_ the villain, _you’re_ supposed to check what kind of schedule your target is on!”

“What kind of villains do you have over there in NRC?! Villains don’t abide by schedules, we attack whenever we want, whoever we want! That’s the whole _point_!”

“That’s cos your population is three football teams and a chicken! You don’t need schedules cos nobody has anything else to do ever!”

“Oh, go be jealous of our _freedom_ quietly somewhere else, big city slicker. Like out on the street.”

“Go learn how to respect your nemesis’s time! They have scheduling apps for it these days!”

“Yeah? Did you have one on the phone you just chucked into my vat of glorbs? Great aim, by the way.”

Laser chucked his helmet next, but Boxman caught it in time and put it on Jethro’s head. Ernesto chucked a crayon, not wanting to be left out. Laser chucked it back. Darrell and the mysterious orange bot both heaved a fire extinguisher, at which point their dad had to stop them and replace it with much more user-friendly plastic cubes with the alphabet on them.

“And remember kids, we don’t kill heroes, especially when they have so much mileage left in them,” Boxman said paternally.

It finally dawned on Laserblast that he was probably not being taken very seriously.

Which, come to think of it, was just as well, because he’d had it up to here with seriousness lately. A chuckle bubbled up in his chest, and then another, and then he exploded in laughter. He had to sit down on a crate to catch his breath. 

For such an utterly infuriating character, Boxman seemed to have a very soothing effect on him, he realized.

“Tell you what, Laser,” Boxman said as he produced an honest-to-Cob fishing net with a folding handle and dipped it into the glorb vat. “Why don’t you go pick up your junk from that villa while I make some blunch, and then you can stay here, if you like? It’s a big factory, plenty of space.”

“OH COB YES,” Laser’s brain and other organs screamed at him.

“I don’t know,” he said demurely instead. His teammates would blow a collective fuse if they ever found out he’d not only lost Mr. Claus, but then proceeded to stay with the prime suspect, and a villain to boot. Tiny, adorable boot. Ehem.

“Suit yourself,” Boxman shrugged and continued to rummage around the vat, trying to scoop the phone. “If you don’t want to, then-”

“I humbly accept your generosity,” Laser croaked immediately. Was it just his imagination, or did Boxman smirk really, _really_ se... ehem, _evilly_ at that?

* * *

And that was how, about an hour later, after kicking some local heroic butt into searching more thoroughly for Mr. Claus, Laser found himself back in front of Boxmore with his backpack and a modest fitness bag full of luggage. It had started snowing prettily again, and there was nobody telling him about the True Spirit of Shopping for Gifts, and he had a hot blunch to look forward to… and he found that he could, in fact, get used to this.

 _Unfortunately, you’re a hero, and he’s a villain_ , his conscience chimed in. He happily ignored it like a troupe of off-key Cobsmas carollers. 

* * *

After dinner, Boxman showed him to a wing of the factory that was a little quieter and cleaner than the rest of it. When he pulled out a key, Laser had to squash a small, but brightly optimistic hope he’d had that Boxmore had only one bed, and it belonged to its owner. Would he be so lucky, though, he sighed in resignation.

Boxman unlocked a random door and showed him into a small, cosy room with no decorations, other than a few blueprints and posters of very beautifully coiffured celebrities that Laser didn’t know. Someone had lived here, he realized. An ex, maybe? His brows furrowed.

“You can use this room, just air it a bit first,” Boxman bounced to the window, threw it open and then swiftly gathered the sheets covering the bed and the small sofa. “There’s no bathroom, but you can use the one at the end of the hallway. Green door, can’t miss it.”

“Thanks,” Laser said and put his luggage down. “Who-”

“I’ll go bring you sheets and stuff!” Boxman exclaimed quickly and scurried away. Then he screeched to a halt at the threshold. “Oh, and someone named Carol called,” he said, rummaging through his pocket. “Here, I dried your phone. It works now.”

Laser pursed his lips and took it, nodding his thanks. His first impulse was not to call back, but then he got worried that something might have happened to Fink and did so anyway.

* * *

Fink was, fortunately, perfectly fine, if more destructive than usually. Laser really didn’t understand why everyone else had such a hard time dealing with her. She was a perfect little angel and very loving and huggable, and was fantastically well-behaved for a mutant rat he had picked up in a literal sewer. She soothed him so.

Which was the exact opposite of what Sparks was doing to him these days. After the epic shouting match that had transpired when he returned to POINT that horrible, horrible night at the donut shop (not his proudest moment; in fact, a whole string of his least proud moments), he had not been able to see Carol as the same person he had once dated. 

“No, Sparks, I promise that I have it all under control,” he managed through gritted teeth. He was determined not to hang up on her this time. “We’ll just be a couple of days late. It’s hardly the end of the world.”

He noticed Boxman, who had returned with a pile of bedding and was looking at him curiously over it.

“Yes, we’ll be back by Cobsmas,” he said as he got up from the bed and let Boxman set down the load. “And even if I don’t, it’s not like there are any plans hanging on me being there.”

Boxman started making the bed, derailing Laser’s thoughts just enough to let him remain civil on the phone.

“It’s _fine_ , Sparks. I’m a big guy. I can handle myself. Just make sure Fink is fine.”

He sank into the sofa as soon as the call was over and rubbed his face, trying to reign in his frustration.

Which became increasingly easy when his eyes completely coincidentally strayed to Boxman’s posterior, happily bouncing around as he finished making the bed. He tried not to drool.

“Girlfriend problems?” Boxman asked.

“Huh?”

“Just now. On the phone. Are you two… co-parenting?”

“Oh!” Laser blinked. “She’s not my girlfriend. Not after… not for some time now.”

“Huh?” Boxman looked over his shoulder with interest. “But the newspapers-”

“I told you the newspapers don’t know _anything_ ,” he bristled and tried to calm down. None of this was Boxman’s fault, he reminded himself. “We broke up after… well, you must have read about it. That donut shop incident.”

“Uhm… the one where you got blown up or something..?” Boxman tapped a talon to his lips. “Or was that the one with the giant pterodactyl attack on POINT?”

Laser was taken aback. For the first time, it occurred to him that what had seemed like the most life-shattering event to him and those around him was little more than background noise to so many other people who… well, who just lived their lives. And who maybe didn’t care all that much what the newspapers had to say about him. It should have been a terrible blow to his ego, but instead, he found it… soothing, in a weird way.

“Laser?”

“Yeah, I got blown up,” he said while his eyes took in every little detail on Boxman’s cute round face. “And some more stuff happened besides. After which I… I couldn’t ever look at her the same way again.” Laser gulped. Cob, he would kill for a cherry sucker just about now. “But for a lot of complicated reasons, we haven’t told the media that.”

“And the kid? What was her name, Fink?”

“Fink’s a minion. I found her at the site of the donut shop explosion. I don’t think any parents will come forward, so I think I’ll adopt her at some point.”

“Oh Cob, what a relief!” Boxman exclaimed and made a _phew_ gesture. “So it was like that.”

“Oh?” Laser perked up immediately. “You… wished I was single? Cos I am.” He plastered on his most seductive, cover-of-an-adult-magazine-worthy smile and lounged back on the sofa. It was truly a Cobsmas miracle, how quickly his libido could override his darker moods these holidays.

“Pfft, good for you,” Boxman waved that off with a frankly crushing cheer, “I was just wondering what kind of _cobsdanged creep_ you had to be to keep ogling my ‘gun’ every chance you got, if you already had a celeb hero girlfriend and a kid back at home.”

“I- Wha- Wut- WHUOAT!” Laser almost fell off the sofa he had been lounging on. Of all the things he had never, in his wildest nightmares, expected anyone to call him _ever_ , “cobsdanged creep” had to be the absolute top. And coming from his very own crush, no less! Why, that was-

_Hold on. Crush?_

_Oh Cob._

_Oooooh Cob_.

He screamed internally and curled into a tight little ball of desperate embarrassment and all sorts of other feelings that made his face turn as bright red as Mr. Claus’s nose.

“You alright there, big city slicker?” Boxman came over and patted his hair soothingly with a sharply-taloned hand, scratching a bit just where Laser liked it. It sent a shiver down his entire body.

“Peachy,” Laser managed. “And I’m _not_ a cobsdanged creep. Or any other creep.”

“Good for you,” snickered Boxman, and then added. “Hey, I have an idea, actually.”

“What is it?” Laser asked suspiciously.

“If your heroic posse hasn’t found Mr. Claus by tomorrow, why don’t we team up and do some searching of our own? I know Lakewood pretty well, and I bet I can do a better job than a bunch of stupid heroes.”

“Really?” His eyes went wide. “You want to team up? What happened to destroying Cobsmas and all that?”

“Well, I can’t do anything about it if I don’t know where Mr. Claus is, can I?” Boxman shrugged. “We can decide what to do with him _after_ we find him. What do you say?”

“Alright,” Laser grinned.

“Alright!” Boxman cheered and grabbed his hand in a hearty handshake.

Before Laser could use it to pull him down to sit with him, Boxman had already skipped to the door.

“Oh, and by the way, there’s no heating in this room either!” he chirped. “I’d close that window and cover up well if I were you. I’ve left you three blankets, wake me up if you need more. Nighty-night!”

And out he went, slamming the door after him, leaving Laser alone and feeling very much cobbed, in more ways than one.

* * *

Across the highway from Boxmore, one late regular customer showed a certain bodegaman a funny video they’d taken the same day at the mall. The buff man not only did _not_ find it funny, but almost broke the customer’s phone in his grip as he watched a black-clad hero sandwich a round white figure against a wall. Then he went, presumably, to get a haircut.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So the hero and the hunk team up! Wow! Who would have thought!? XD
> 
> I welcome all sorts of opinions about their very professional fight in the mall, or our bb Laser's revelation, or how you're dealing with The True Spirit of Shopping for Gifts, or a preview of the beautiful emoji you have on your device!


	5. The Spirit of Forgiveness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's a reminder of what Mr. Gar and Mr. Logic's happy union looked like. Our bb Laser may not be entirely off base. XD
> 
> Enjoy!

♪♪♪ On the fourth day of Cobsmas, my baby gave to me four stolen ciders ♪♪♪

* * *

By mid-morning, the events of the last three days had settled in his head and it had started to dawn on Laserblast that he was in a really unusual, unprecedented, slightly frightening and very, very unfortunate situation. Nothing even remotely resembling that had ever happened to him, and he was out of his depth. What else could he do that he hadn't already done? He had followed the same process as in every other similar situation, and yet, there was zero result so far. 

Was he missing some obvious clue as to the solution to this predicament? Some detail that had escaped his notice? He decided to go through his mental inventory one more time as he glumly helped clean up after breakfast.

So far, he had tried his level best come-hither wink, lounging suggestively in a variety of poses, fighting sexily, outright complimenting Boxy’s, erm, ‘gun’ (maybe it had not been the best word choice, but it was what it was), staring at Boxy dreamily and when he got desperate, parading in front of Boxy’s bedroom only in slacks, and then only in undies, and then only in a bath towel. Normally, any of these, and especially the last three, should have landed anyone in his lap.

And yet, Boxman continued to be fully clothed, a respectable distance away, and chattering about something distinctly unsexy, like Cobsmas. Laser just didn’t understand it. He was starting to suspect Boxman of being straight, which he personally considered a great tragedy to the world, and to himself in particular. He sighed while Boxman, uncaring, continued to talk about finding Mr. Claus.

Oh, yeah. Come to think of it, there was that little problem, too. He’d lost Mr. Claus. And needed to find him. Right.

“So, basically, your local heroes found nothing,” Boxman was saying as he ushered the four baby bots out of the kitchen. Laser tagged along.

“Nothing. I sent them to check everywhere again this morning. And no ransom demands either. It’s like he just vanished into thin air.”

“Well, if he isn't in Lakewood and hasn’t been seen leaving it, this only leaves one option. The Danger Zone!”

“What would he do there?” Laser winced. “It’s called that for a reason, and Mr. Claus didn’t strike me as very brave. _I_ wouldn’t set foot in there, and I’m a superhero.”

“Hmm… Hey, weren’t you complaining just yesterday that he kept getting distracted by anything shiny and Cobsmas-y and kept going for walks and stuff?”

“So?”

“Have you _looked_ at the plaza on the other side of the road?” Boxman rolled his eyes and pointed to the window of the bots’ playroom.

Laser blinked in surprise, went to the window and beheld… an abomination. There were so many Cobsmas decorations on the bodega that it could be mistaken for a corn farm covered in snow and mistletoe. There were more lights than in the lighting section of an IKEA. There were fake reindeer, and people, presumably staff, with antlers and corn outfits milling around ringing bells and handing out things. Billboards and signs with what looked like Cobsmas slogans were abound. He shivered.

“Why would he even come all this way?” Laser asked and chewed on his lip. “Surely, he would not have followed _me_ here, would he? I mean, I was his bodyguard, and he did rely on me to keep him safe… So after you spooked him, maybe he wanted to stay close to me… and I… I let him do-”

“Oh, pffft,” Boxman made a rude sound that very much took Laser out of his dramatic musings. “He came because of _this_ ,” he exclaimed and shoved a pamphlet in Laser’s face. Or under his chin, anyway.

“Lakewood Plaza Turbo,” Laser took it and read, “The biggest, most cheery, most holiday-spirited Cobsmas extravaganza… Oh, Cob.”

“Yeah, sickening, isn’t it!?” Boxman fumed and shook a fist at the bodega. “And it’s run by _heroes_ , no less! That danged bodegaman and his pal!” He jumped on the windowsill and shouted at the gaudy display, “I will destroy your precious Cobsmas, you hear me!!”

“No, I mean, I saw one of these!” Laser exclaimed. “Someone handed it to us on our first day here, at the mall. I remembered it because I thought it was so horrible. Mr. Claus must have seen it, too.”

“I don’t know how anyone could see _that_ ,” Boxman pointed at the pamphlet without touching it, “and still decide to come here voluntarily.”

“It all makes sense!” Laser grabbed Boxman’s arm. “And the local heroes might not have looked here because they knew I was coming to check out Boxmore, and they would have thought I’d cover the bodega, too!”

“Alright!” Boxman cheered. “Let’s go! Just lemme grab the bazooka and the cannon and-”

“Wait a moment,” Laser held him in place on the windowsill and looked at him carefully. “Is there something I should know about you and the bodega people? If we’re going to charge in there, I don’t want to walk blindly into some personal vendetta you have with them.”

“Why would you think that?” Boxman asked, shifty-eyed.

Laser glared at him with his best ominous “I’m about to end your career, oh, evildoer” look.

“Ok, ok!” Boxman flailed his arms adorably and hopped off the windowsill. “That danged bodegaman stole the plot of land I wanted! And he built that eyesore of a plaza that’s teeming with heroes! And he lured my Mr. Logic with his, his, his _heroic nonsense_! And now they’re shacked up oh, so cosily over there, and being all heroic together! Just the sight of that plaza makes me sick!” He shouted. “So there! I want to destroy their plaza, and their Cobsmas, and their disgusting shmoopy heroic stupidity!”

“His Mr. Logic,” Laser repeated to himself darkly. So the bedroom he had slept in _had_ belonged to an ex indeed. The idea made his skin crawl. That probably explained why Boxman wasn’t succumbing to his charms, too, he thought, his brow furrowing.

“Erm. Laser, look,” Boxman said nervously in the darkly scowling face of big-city superheroism. “If you feel that strongly about not being seen cooperating with a villain, I can _maaaybe_ behave _just this once_ while we go check out the bodega, but you can’t expect me to-”

“Huh?” Laser blinked. Oh, yes, they were supposed to be hero and villain. Right. “Er, no, not really. Off the record, anyone who makes that much of a big deal over Cobsmas deserves anything you can throw at them. Literally.”

“Really?” Boxman gave such a manic, threatening, shark-toothed leer that Laser’s knees went weak and he felt the inexplicable urge to lounge on something. Preferably Boxman’s bed. Or Boxman himself. Ehem.

“Yes, Boxy, really,” he said weakly, and then recovered. “Although, let me take you up on that offer and start with some surveillance first. We don’t know what might have happened at the bodega, or if your bazooka might be needed at all.”

“Oh, ok. I suppose _just this once_ I can behave,” Boxman said, after a fluffed-up pause.

“Noted,” Laser grinned. “I won’t make you do it again.” 

He couldn’t wait to meet the mysterious Mr. Logic.

* * *

Laser, in his most inconspicuous civvie outfit, stared slack-jawed at Mr. Logic and his barbershop from across the plaza parking lot. No matter what he had imagined he was up against, that was decidedly not it. He realized that if _that_ was Boxman’s type, he stood a zero chance of ever getting his hands on the cute bouncy villain. The one time he really needed his looks to work for him, dang it!

He shot a calculating look at the deeply inconspicuous Boxman next to him in his bright red bomber jacket, neon yellow hat, neon green sneakers, probably a kilo of jewelry and star-shaped sunglasses. If he was any sort of judge, Boxman had not spoken properly to Mr. Logic in a long time, and so the hapless barber had no way of knowing what his ex was really up to. 

And if Laser couldn’t have his Boxy because of that robot guy, he decided, he could at least have a tiny bit of revenge. So he grabbed Boxman’s hand and lovingly stuck it in his own pocket.

A snaggle-toothed Boxman stared up at him.

“We’re here incognito, remember?” Laser said slyly. “At least until we figure out if Mr. Claus is here and why. And see how many couples there are.”

Boxman didn’t seem all that convinced, but he pulled him along without removing his hand, and ooooh Cob, that was just _the cutest_ little blush Laser had ever seen! Adorable!

“Aren’t you worried people would look?” Boxman mumbled into his purple and green muffler as they passed by a sign ‘Dojo for rent’ and still saw no Mr. Claus. “Don’t you superheroes worry about your reputations all the time?”

“If they’re looking, that must be because of you,” Laser replied and then hurriedly clarified, “by which I mean, you live right on the other side of the road, they might recognize you.”

“Worry about yourself, big city slicker.”

“I’ll be fine,” Laser said happily. “All I ever need to do is keep my helmet on when I’m on the job, and I can enjoy all the fame of hero-dom as well as all the privacy of anonymity. It’s the best. Nobody ever recognizes _me_ , unless I want them to.”

Boxman looked suitably impressed. “That’s-”

“LASERBLAST!!” a gruff voice shouted at them and they both whirled around, assuming fighting positions.

“I saw you! Just now!” the buff guy Laser remembered being turned into snow makizushi was pointing an accusatory finger at the two of them. “Don’t pretend! I saw his hand in your pocket!”

“Er… look, buddy...” Laser tried.

“Wow,” Boxman deadpanned. “You were saying about anonymity?”

“How could you do this?!” the bodegaman fumed. “I tried to give you the benefit of the doubt yesterday when I saw that video of your fight in the mall, but this?!”

“And what’s it to you?!” Boxman hopped in on the forming street attraction.

“On top of everything you cooked up at POINT? Don’t you have _any_ shame?!” The buff guy caught Boxman by the lapels and absently chucked him on top of a Cobsmas tree without even looking at him.

Laser stared at him shocked.

“I couldn't say anything before because you were a senior member, but this is crossing a line!” He crossed his arms and glared down at Laser, which was very impressive, since he was by no means small himself. 

“...”

“Well? Don’t you have anything to say for yourself?”

“...Who are you?” Laser squinted at him hard.

“Eugene Garcia!”

“Doesn’t ring a bell,” Laser shook his head.

“EL-BOW!!” the hero roared and ignited his elbow, to drive the point home. Or possibly into Laser’s skull.

“Oooh,” Laser said and nodded with conviction, fondling the angry hero’s biceps. “Yes, I see. I should have recognized these. Good to see you’ve stayed in shape.”

“Don’t you have anything to say for yourself, I asked!” Mr. Gar pulled his arm free and shuffled away, glaring.

“Hm? What for?” Laser asked absently, watching Boxman chuck corn decorations from atop the tree at the festive passers-by, before losing his balance and falling.

“You’re cheating on Carol! With a _villain_! How could you?”

“Oh, for the love of corn starch!” Laser exploded. “What is it with everyone and _cheating_! Do I look that much like a cheating creep?!”

“Not gonna lie~” came a gleeful shout from the direction of the Cobsmas tree and Laser glared at Boxman.

“Look,” Laser pinched the bridge of his nose and squeezed shut his eyes. “If you had not just upped and _disappeared_ like that, you’d _know_ that I broke up with Sparks right after the donut shop incident.”

“Huh?” Mr. Gar looked shocked. “B-but why?!”

“You know very well why,” Laser glared.

“I don’t,” Boxman trotted over and inserted himself in the conversation.

“Neither do I,” a confused Mr. Gar scratched his head.

“You were _there_ ,” Laser waved his arm in an angry gesture. “You heard her.”

“No, I was _in custody_ , because the whole fiasco _you_ caused got pinned on _me_ ,” Mr. Gar bristled.

“Oh. Really?” Laser’s eyebrows shot up. “Will you look at that. And I was wondering why that whole thing blew over so easily.”

“You didn’t check what happened to me!? You didn’t even notice I was gone?!” he shouted and Laser and Boxman took a cautious step back.

Laser shrugged charmingly and smiled like a cherub.

“Sooo, you two knew each other, huh? Howwww, exactly?” Boxman inserted.

“Didn’t you face any consequences whatsoever over your experiments?” Mr. Gar asked, disbelieving. “Foxtail was dead set against any such dirty tricks.”

“Experiments and dirty tricks?” Boxman bounced with excitement. “What experiments and dirty tricks?” Suddenly, he was seeing the hero in a whole new light.

“Oh, those,” Laser waved a hand dismissively. “We outvoted her.” And then he added, at the sight of Mr. Gar’s dropped jaw, “Turns out I severely misjudged Dr. Greyman. He was totally on board with using infused glorbs. You didn’t hear it from me, but they’re already planning to mass-produce infused glorb weapons.”

Mr. Gar’s jaw hit the ground.

“Sparks and Rippy voted with Foxtail, but they’re just junior members, so Dr. Greyman and I outvoted her, since you weren’t there to break the vote,” he explained happily. “We’re all cool on that front.”

“This is insane,” Mr. Gar managed. “And Carol?”

“Hm? She’s still a junior member, she’ll just have to live with it.”

“That’s-”

“Gentlemen, maybe it’s best to stop here,” a gentle metallic voice carried over and one Mr. Logic emerged from the crowd of onlookers. Boxman bristled immediately.

“YOU!” he shouted and pointed at the small robot.

“You,” Laser hissed and took a step closer to Boxman’s side, putting a hand on his shoulder.

“The most logical way to deal with this situation is to go inside,” and he pointed to his own barbershop, “and talk calmly. After all, it’s the season of forgiveness and the best time to-”

“Oh, the spirit of _forgiveness_?” Laser’s hackles went up. He hadn’t heard one of those speeches since Mr. Claus disappeared and wasn’t looking forward to getting one now. “Funny you should bring it up. Maybe _you_ have something you feel the need to be forgiven for?”

“Well, I…” Mr. Logic hesitated, taken aback, and then his eyes darted towards Boxman. Laser bristled at that. So things were exactly as he’d surmised, he thought. “I suppose that while I cannot apologize for my actions, the manner in which I left Boxmore perhaps was not the best,” he offered hesitantly.

“Cannot apologize for your actions, you traitor!?” Boxman shouted. “After everything I did for you! After all the plans we had! We were going to destroy the plaza! And so much more besides! And you left for _what_!?” he raged, and Laser’s heart constricted. He hadn’t realized how deeply Boxman had been hurt. His poor Boxy.

“That is not a logical thing to do!” Mr. Logic insisted passionately (well, relatively speaking). “I explained to you how I felt. Or at least I tried to. And then Mr. Gar showed me how much better my life could be if I just followed my heart!”

Laserblast gasped. Even in the heat of the supernova of a shouting match he’d had with Carol when they had broken up, he hadn’t received such a burn. He fought hard the urge to hug his Boxy protectively. But he was a superhero, and his survival instincts told him that an actual supernova was a safer place to be than between a man and his ex after a bad breakup. So he turned to Mr. Gar instead while the shouting match raged on.

“Wow, El Bow,” he deadpanned. “I would have never pegged you for such a family wrecker.”

Mr. Gar sputtered in indignation.

“You go and lure away naive young robots,” he gestured at the scene “and then you have the guts to ask _me_ to defend myself over _my_ relationship choices? Wow. Just wow.”

“I- It’s- I never ‘lured away’ anyone!” Mr. Gar shouted.

“Oh, yes, I’m sure,” Laser said and draped himself over Mr. Gar’s shoulder in that particular way he knew was guaranteed to make him short-circuit. “I’m sure that Mr. Logic just came running into your wide-open arms, eh? Smoke coming out of his nostrils, sort of thing? Did you two defeat a monster together to celebrate?”

“I- You- I resent the way you put it! That’s why I never could talk to you in POINT!” Mr. Gar, red-faced, turned on his heels and made ready to stomp away.

Mr. Logic, ditching his shouting match with Boxman, ran and grabbed his arm.

“Mr. Gar, please. It’s Cobsmas. It’s the time of forgiveness and reaching out, trying to understand those who have antagonized us,” he said in his calm, mild voice, and it made Mr. Gar pause. “Let us at least find out why your former teammate has come all the way here to find you? It stands to reason that he had a better motive than destroying your Cobsmas. He’s a hero, after all.”

“Like you’re the one to talk about heroic behavior,” Laser growled under his breath.

“Oh!” Boxman thumped his fist on his open palm next to him. “That’s right! I _knew_ we came here without bazookas for something!”

Laser blinked. Right. Once again, he had forgotten about that little problem of theirs.

“Where’s Santa?” Boxman asked and then pointed accusingly at the two plaza heroes. “And no beating around the bush! If you have him, we’ll find him and take him back! No matter what you do to stop us!”

“Erm.” Mr. Logic looked confused to Mr. Gar who just shrugged. “Sure. He’s at the back.”

Boxman and Laser exchanged a look and ran.

* * *

Laserblast massaged his forehead, one hand on his hip and one crying part-timer hanging off his coat front.

“This is the second time! The _second_ time this has happened!” The man bemoaned. “I was robbed at my previous job! I was bonked on the head right at my part-time workplace, and my uniform was stolen, and now there’s an impostor in my place!”

Laser’s eye twitched. 

“And I went to that famous big city superhero that was there at the time and asked him for help, and he told me-”

“You know,” Laser snapped, “when I told you ‘seek professional help,’ I meant something more along the lines of an unemployment exchange and good therapist combo, and less along the lines of following me around and crying about being laid off!”

The man, who apparently had not recognized him without the mask ( _now_ his anonymity was kicking in!), finally let go of his coat and stared wide-eyed.

“Boxman! Found anything?” Laser called towards the mountain of Cobsmas decorations and gift boxes that Boxman was currently swimming through like a whale, under the shocked stares of Mr. Gar, Mr. Logic and probably all of the plaza population.

“Nothing!” Boxman emerged, dragging a protesting part-time elf by the leggings. “Mr. Claus isn’t here. Poop!” he exclaimed and dumped the poor elf in a cornbread basket display.

“Wait,” Mr. Logic chimed in. “It’s not logical for you to be looking for Mr. Claus. Aren’t you his bodyguard?”

“Well, you see,” Laser charmingly scratched the back of his head and blushed a bit. “He disappeared yesterday. You know, at the mall.”

“Yeah,” Boxman joined him. “We thought he might have come here, what with all the Cobsmas stuff you got. Apparently not, though.”

“Yeah, sorry for the trouble,” Laser tagged on. “I guess we’ll just be leaving now.”

“I think maybe we can take one last look at-”

“WHOAT,” Mr. Gar shouted and the two co-conspirators cowered. “YOU LOST-”

Mr. Logic slapped a decisive metallic hand on his mouth. “It is not logical to let everyone know that,” he murmured quietly.

“You lost Mr. Claus?! The embodiment of Cobsmas?! You lost him?” Mr. Gar shout-whispered.

“Err...” Boxman raised a finger. “It’s not as bad as it sounds...”

“And you’re just sitting around and doing _nothing_?”

“I already followed all the protocols,” Laser said, mustering some professional offense. “Lakewood is on high alert. It’s only the Danger Zone that-”

“THE DANGER ZONE!” Mr. Gar and Mr. Logic exclaimed together.

“That’s where we think he went,” Laser supplied perfectly innocently.

Mr. Gar and Mr. Logic squeaked and ran off in opposite directions, gathering volunteers, organizing a search and generally starting a flurry of activity. Laser watched with satisfaction as an air of busy activity replaced the placid, clowning sweetness of the ‘Cobsmas extravaganza’ and everyone eagerly prepared to get to work. Boxman watched the chaos for a bit, too, and then rolled up his sleeves and made to join. However, a gloved hand gently but firmly grabbed him by the bicep and pulled flush to Laser’s side.

“And where are _you_ going?” he asked casually.

“Well. To search the Danger Zone and find Mr. Claus?” Boxman looked up. “Why, where were _you_ going to go?”

“No, Box. _They_ are going to search the Danger Zone and find Mr. Claus. _We_ ,” Laser stressed with a smirk, “are going to get a nice hot on-the-go cup of whatever you fancy and go wait in your warm, cosy factory and play with the bots. Your Mr. Logic wants to be a hero? Let him go be a hero then.”

The look of admiration on Boxman’s face was totally worth losing one Mr. Claus, Laser decided.

“Wow. Are you _sure_ you’re a hero?” Boxman asked.

“Huh?” Laser blinked in surprise. “Of course. Superhero even. What else would I be?”

“Really? Not an antihero, at the very least?”

“I’m not anti anything.”

“Cos I couldn’t help noticing that, ehm,” Boxman gave him a look, “you’re not being exactlyyyyy very heroic all the time.”

“Well. I mean. Being a barber at a small-town bodega also isn’t particularly heroic. And yet there’s your Mr. Logic, being a hero. He is that because he says he is, not because he’s done anything particularly heroic,” Laser explained. “Being a hero is more about what you are and less about what you do.” He looked away.

Yes, that’s why it didn’t matter much what reckless heroics he ever got up to. Underneath it all, he had never been all that heroic or powerful, and now he was outright…

He shook his head and tried to stay in the present. Focus on Boxy, he told himself. It was so much easier to forget his problems when Boxy was around.

And Boxman was pulling at his sleeve.

“Hey? Are you alright?” he looked concerned. Oh, dang. “I didn’t mean to hurt your heroic pride or anything.”

“It’s alright,” Laser did his best to smile. “There isn’t much to hurt, these days.”

“Huh?”

“In any case, let’s go get those drinks and go back home while your ex finds Mr. Claus, hopefully,” he said and started towards the bodega.

“My what?”

Laser bit his tongue way too late and tried to look casual. “Well, Mr. Logic is a barber and that room you gave me was plastered with fancy haird-”

“EWWW!”

Laser went bug-eyed.

“You think Mr. Logic is- I- EW!” Boxman flailed his arms. “He’s my creation! I _made_ him! Like the quadruplets! Only they’re better because they _listen_ to me! They’re going to be absolutely _evil_!”

“Oooh,” Laser exhaled in relief.

“Is that why you were acting like that to him?”

“I- He- N-no, of course not! I don’t know what you mean!”

Boxman fluffed up, crossed his arms and gave him a long, measuring, deeply suspicious look that he wasn't sure how to interpret. He sweated despite the first snowflakes of the day landing on him.

“You’re not letting go, are you? I thought you’d given up.”

“Sorry?”

Boxman seemed to conclude something in his mind and grinned.

“You know what, big city slicker, normally I’d be thrilled with your evil idea to let someone else do the manual labor. However,” he grabbed Laser’s hand and wiggled his eyebrows. “You don’t know what you’ll be missing, in this case.”

He whipped out a small device with a button on it and pressed it. There was a muted crash from somewhere far.

“I’d be missing… a visit to the _Danger_ Zone? In the middle of _winter_? In _snowfall_?” For someone whose uniform consisted of a tank top and spandex slacks, Laser really disliked the cold. 

“No, you poor heroic soul,” Boxman grinned his shark smile that melted Laser’s brain into pink goo. “You’ll be missing a visit to the Danger Zone _villain style_.”

He executed a perfect, showy bow, hopped unexpectedly high in the air, and landed on top of… a flying desk? Laser jumped a step back.

“Now let’s go have some real fun, shall we?” Boxman wiggled his eyebrows, and before he could answer, he grabbed him by the muffler and the coat front, hauled him onto the desk, and shouted “LIFTOFF!”

Laser grabbed onto the long-coveted soft middle for dear life. Ooooh Cob, so soft and warm!

* * *

Not too surprisingly, the search led to nothing, but that didn’t matter one kernel to an absolutely _giddy_ Laserblast who returned that evening to the Neutral Zone slightly charred, sweaty and piloting the desk as if he’d owned it his whole life. Boxman was the one grabbing onto his midsection and looking like someone who might soon use the phrase “oops, I created a monster.”

During the very professional and serious search of the Danger Zone, the two of them had shot a brontosaurus in the butt, almost crashed into an active volcano, had a dirt race against a flying saucer of what turned out to be Dr. Greyman’s estranged second cousins once removed, and netted Mr. Gar on two separate occasions, with the elaborate excuses of “Oh, hey, I didn’t see you there!” and “Oopsie! I thought you were Mr. Claus! Huh, I guess one balding spot looks much like another from up here!” Only one of the two was Boxman’s line.

And the best part, in Laser’s humble opinion? He had gotten to hug and fondle Boxman’s wonderful, soft, warm, huggable, perfect waist every time the desk made even the smallest adjustment in speed or altitude. Which was all the time. So what? Laser was very pronouncedly not one of the airborne heroes. Everyone knew that. He had given it up only after Boxman told him he could try piloting the desk.

“Why are we stopping here?” Boxman asked from under his arm when he finally landed in a small parking lot, to the amazed stares of a few passers-by.

“Well, I don’t know about you, but I can use a good dinner. So,” Laser gestured at the restaurant in front of them and hopped off the desk, offering his hand to the wide-eyed Boxman.

“This is the fanciest restaurant in Lakewood,” Boxman ignored the hand and hopped off, giving the place a suspicious look.

“Is it? I mean. It is!” Lucky him! “It’s the least I can do. You’ve been feeding me practically since I came to Lakewood.” Then, after seeing Boxman’s hesitation, he added not at all pleadingly, “Humor me? Please? Or if there’s another place you prefer...”

“No, this one is fine.” Boxman shook his head and straightened up, magnanimously offering Laser his elbow. The grinning Laser had to stoop only just a little to take it.

* * *

“Who would have thought that those guys could actually make good stuff,” Boxman said as they strolled in the freshly fallen snow towards Boxmore. “I mean, once you order enough portions to actually feel full,” he added with a happy, loud burp.

“Cob, he’s disgusting,” Laser thought smittenly and nodded his agreement.

“I didn’t ruin your heroic retirement plan with the cost of that dinner, did I?” Boxman asked cheerfully.

“Don’t worry. I promise you, I’m the hero with the most astute retirement plan in the whole of NRC. However...”

Boxman looked up just in time to see him wiggle his eyebrows and grin hungrily.

“I definitely wouldn't refuse if you were in the mood to offer me _something_ for dessert.”

“Oh. Ok,” Boxman said.

“Wut?” Laser slipped on the iced sidewalk and almost kissed the pavement. “Really?!”

“I thought that with all the commotion, you hadn’t noticed that I pinched them,” the villain commented while rummaging in the drawer of the flying desk that was following them sedately. “But I guess there’s something to your whole superhero reputation, after all.”

And Boxman handed him one of his own cherry suckers. He’d wondered where his stash had gone, and had suspected the cumulus hero, Sunshine.

“Thanks,” he managed to say without sounding crushingly disappointed.

There was a silence for some time, while Laser popped the sucker into his mouth and just enjoyed the sight of the snowy nighttime Lakewood. It occurred to him that he hadn’t craved any kind of lollipop the entire day. In fact, it was the first day in a long time that he hadn’t needed one. Maybe there was something to that whole countryside lifestyle, after all, he mused.

“By the way, look what else I got,” Boxman said eventually and produced four bottles of apple cider with a shiny bodega label on them. He removed the caps with his teeth, making Laser almost run into a lamppost at the sight, and handed him one.

“Liberated it from El Bow’s bodega, huh?”

“Yeah,” Boxman said, his mind clearly on something else. After a long moment, he said, “You know, I was thinking about what you said before.”

“Yeah?” 

“About you and Mr. Logic being heroes because you said so. Even if you aren’t doing anything particularly heroic. I never distinguished what you do and what you are before.”

“Well. To be fair, what you do usually reflects what you are,” Laser said, looking away. It was not his preferred topic of conversation, but he wasn’t about to say so to Boxman.

“I couldn’t be anything other than a villain, no matter what I do. Ever. For any reason. And I would never even want to be anything else.”

“That’s great,” Laser said sincerely, and with some suppressed envy. “It’s cool, knowing who you are and what you do. Having it figured out.” 

“You, a hero, think that being a villain is great and cool?” Boxman gave him a sideways look. “You’re not going to try to seduce me to the side of heroism, and stuff?”

“Not to the side of heroism, no,” Laser said wistfully. 

“Huh.”

“Is it something to do with Mr. Logic?” Laser asked after a moment. “Your thinking about heroism.”

“Well, I thought that maaaybe it’s the same for you heroes. Just like me, you can’t help being what you are. I mean…” he sighed and made a resigned gesture with the bottle. “I never made him _explicitly_ evil. It’s not something you can program into robots. I just made him _logical_ , and assumed being evil was the only logical option. I guess... I made a mistake making him, probably. So he turned out being… _that_.”

“Well, maybe not a _mistake_ , just… not exactly what you intended,” Laser replied carefully, feeling stung on Mr. Logic’s behalf, for some reason. “It happens. Even to the most well-mea... er, evil-meaning plans can turn out not like you intended. People can surprise you with who and what they turn out to be, even robot people.”

Boxman just hummed noncommittally.

“Is that what happened to you and your teammate? What was it, Quicksilver?” he asked after another pause.

“I guess,” Laser shrugged. It was still not his favorite choice of topic.

“But you still trust her to babysit your kid.”

“Oh, don’t get me wrong, she’s not a bad person. I don’t blame her for what happened. Plus, she’d make a terrific mom. And as a teammate, I’d trust her with my life. Only… not with my… self.”

“Did she-”

“So I guess what I mean to say is,” Laser said hurriedly, not wanting to spend his time with Boxman discussing his ex, “you can maybe try to accept Mr. Logic for what he is, even if it’s not what you expected him to be. You don’t have to like it, just… live with it. Plus, a barber is hardly the most treacherous occupation he could have chosen.”

“Hmm. Maybe. Maybe I can… think about that. I guess not all heroes are equally terrible.”

Laser smiled and clinked their stolen apple cider bottles together and took a sip. They didn’t talk about anything else important while they finished the four stolen bottles of cider, and soon after, they reached Boxmore. 

That night, Laser played with the bots while Boxman looked into some work matters and decided against parading in a bath towel in front of his bedroom. Instead, he called Carol and for once, neither of them hung up on the other. It was a peaceful night at Boxmore.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, our bb Boxy is doing real leaps and strides in his interpersonal relationships, eh? At least by his standards. XD
> 
> Any opinions on the great relationship between Mr. Gar and our bb Laser? Any commiseration for the poor part-timer Santa? Any deep and profound literary analysis or keyboard smashes?


	6. The Season to Be Jolly

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now here's a pic of a bull of the breed Belgian Blue. They all look as if a DC comic book artist tried to draw a superhero cow.
> 
> Enjoy!

♪♪♪ On the fifth day of Cobsmas, my baby gave to me five drawings ♪♪♪

* * *

By the time Boxman reached the kitchen, Laser was already up, a lot of local heroes had been berated on the phone, and a simple breakfast was sizzling in a couple of pans. 

“Morning. Has something happened?” Boxman asked, wide-eyed. “Are we under attack? Is POINT coming?”

“Today, I got some really interesting info. Apparently, when I told your local heroes to round up the usual suspect villains and give them a shake-up, they took that to mean ‘only the ones who want to be shaken up,’ and only if they’re lower level.”

“Why am I not surprised,” Boxman rolled his eyes. “You really think that all heroes are like the ones you have over there in NRC, huh?”

“Cob forbid,” Laser shuddered. “But it means that today, we get to pay a visit to all of your colleagues and shake them up. See if something drops. Just because you’re the only villain who attacked openly doesn’t mean you were the only one after Mr. Claus.”

“Oooh!” Boxman’s leer shone like a small sun. “Yeeees, let’s do that! I’ll give you a list! And their addresses! You can take the flying desk! Aaaanything you need!”

“I like your enthusiasm,” Laser grinned and the two of them cackled evilly.

* * *

“What are those?” Boxman hopped, trying to look over Laser’s shoulder as he rummaged through his fitness bag. “Oooh! Do they have anything to do with the experiments and dirty tricks the bodegaman mentioned!?”

“They do, as a matter of fact,” Laser smirked and carefully took out a locked insulated case. “My teammates won’t let me anywhere near glorbs now, but I still have these babies.”

He opened the case to show rows and rows of test tubes full of colorful liquids. Boxman became starry eyed and tried to grab one, but Laser gently slapped his hand away.

“Careful. If you break some of these, even I won’t be able to bring you back to any functional shape.”

“But what _are_ they?” Boxman gazed lovingly at the tubes.

“Just some very interesting concoctions I cooked up in my lab before it got blown up. I remembered the formulas for many of them, and was able to recreate them easily. This one,” Laser grinned evilly and showed a green one, “can make goo clones of people. The possibilities are _endless_.”

“You can do that?” Boxman’s eyes went heart-shaped this time. “Weren’t you just a marine biologist?”

“That’s my MS. My PhD, on the other hand...” he trailed off slyly and unrolled a vest with tiny pockets for the vials to be concealed in. “I prefer to go incognito again, but I’m not about to stroll into every local villain’s lair unprotected.”

“Oh, yeah?” Boxman sniggered. “That bath towel the other day gave you a lot of protection, did it?”

“I meant, every _other_ villain,” Laser mumbled, not at all blushing.

* * *

“Alright! Who’s our first target for the day?” Laser asked once they were airborne on the desk and out in the cold Lakewood morning.

“Here’s the list!” Boxman shouted happily and waved the paper. “First stop, Big Bull Demon’s castle! He has dungeons and all, so if Mr. Claus is there, he can’t escape alone.” 

“Wow, a castle?” Laser whistled, shifting test-tubes from his special vest to his coat-pockets. “I’d better get some of the strong stuff out, then. A lot of metal gratings and doors, I imagine?”

“Yeah! The place is a scrapyard-owner’s wet dream! Incidentally, BBD is also partially made of metal. I’d know, he was one of the first to place an order at Boxmore!”

“Oh?” Laser stopped his preparation and cocked an eyebrow. “Does that mean we want to go easy on him?”

“Nope!” Boxman chirped. “Hey, look! You can see his castle from here.”

“Is that...” Laser squinted and then his eyes widened. “No way that’s Château du Gros Taureau!”

“Yes, it is rather gross,” Boxman nodded with conviction. “I really don’t care for the horned turrets, myself.”

“No,” Laser rolled his eyes. “That’s the hereditary home of the Bovine Demon clan. It’s the dungeon crawl all dungeon crawls are designed after!” And then, after seeing Boxman’s snaggletooth make an appearance, he sighed and summarized, “old, _very_ famous castle. I thought you’d know more about evil history.”

“Nope, that’s just you. Big city nerd,” Boxman shot back. “How do you even know that?”

“I’ve met Big Belgian Blue Demon in NRC. He’s _very_ popular with the ladies, and a lot of the gentlemen, too.”

“ _Met him_ , have you,” Boxman gave him a highly suspicious look, and Laser had to look away and cough politely to hide his face. 

“Anyway, let me see that list,” Laser said and grabbed the paper. “Tell me more about these people. What are their powers?”

“Powers?” Boxman scratched his tuft. “They don’t have any.”

Laser stared bug-eyed.

“Well, Vormulax is half-ghoul, half-grey alien, so she can teleport. And I guess you don’t want her to scratch you, but that’s about it. I mean, I can take her on, should be no problem for you, too.”

Laser remembered the way Boxman had casually tossed him into a corn-dog stand as if he was a doll and decided to be careful with that Vormulax anyway. Then, Laser had to find a way to unobtrusively cross his legs, _because_ of said remembrance. 

Cob, Boxman was specifically designed to torture him, he thought and tried to picture Mr. Claus and his speeches instead.

* * *

Laser was really not used to facing towering bovine monstrosities without his helmet or his uniform, but he was secretly happy that he was going to test out his inventions in a less controlled environment. And really, any environment that contained Boxman was already the definition of “uncontrolled.” Boxman went on the offensive as soon as the desk landed in the chateau’s courtyard, where its owner was peacefully shoveling the night’s snow.

“Give up now, BBD!” Boxman shouted and waved the extremely modest handgun that Laser had finally conceded that they should bring. “We know your game! Now give back the old man and nobody will get hurt! Mostly!”

“Err… what?” was Big Bull Demon’s eloquent retort.

“Mr. Claus,” Laser chimed in, taking a step and fingering the test-tube in his pocket. “He disappeared the day before yesterday and we think you have him. So give him back.”

“Mr. Claus?” Big Bull Demon scratched behind one horn. “Old man, talks a lot of nonsense, shaped like Boxman over there?”

“ _Hey_!” Shouted both Boxman and Laser, both red-faced.

“I have one of those in the dungeon, but-”

“Yes!” hero and villain shouted and ran for the nearest entrance.

A powerful industrial-sized drill whirred to life and cut off their route.

“And why would I let you into my dungeon?” Big Bull Demon looked at the two from above. “Who I have there is none of your business. Go away.”

The two invaders exchanged evil looks.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Boxman chirped.

“I’ve always wanted to do an authentic dungeon crawl. We don’t get them in the city,” Laser replied and took out a whole selection of test-tubes. “Let’s go!”

* * *

Laserblast massaged his forehead, one hand on his hip and one crying part-timer handing off his coat front.

“This is the third time! The _third cobsdanged time_ this has happened!” The man wailed. “I was robbed at my previous job! I was bonked on the head right at my part-time workplace, and my uniform was stolen, and now there’s an impostor in my place!” Laser’s eye twitched. “And I asked you for help, and you ignored me, and then you went and wrecked my _second_ part-time job, too! And you-”

“Which part of ‘unemployment exchange and good therapist combo’ didn’t you understand the first two times?” Laser snapped. “What were you even doing in a castle dungeon in the middle of nowhere!?”

“I...” the man fidgeted and finally let go of Laser’s coat. “I wanted to relax after what you did to my second part-time job, so I went to a bar, and met BBD, and he told me he had a dungeon and...” the man’s voice died down into a mumble under Laser’s glare. “Ehem. I misunderstood what kind of dungeon he meant,” he finished lamely.

“I really think we have to go NOW!” Boxman, who meanwhile had been fighting off Big Bull Demon’s henchmen at the cell’s entrance, shouted with some urgency.

“Look, you’re a superhero, aren’t you?” the man pleaded. “If you’d just listen to me and try to help me out-”

Laser reached into his vest and took out the big bottle.

* * *

When the fluffy explosions and Laser and Boxman’s laughter died down, they were already high above Lakewood, flying towards the coast. That had been unexpectedly a lot of fun.

Laser leaned back on the desktop and took a long look at Boxman. Yesterday’s conversation on the way home through the snowy nighttime town had really stuck with him, and now that superpowers had been brought up, he really, really wanted to ask him the question that had been bugging him ever since he first properly talked to him.

“Hey Boxman,” he called against the cold breeze of the flying desk. “Why haven’t you asked me what my powers are? Now that you know that the helmet’s just… a gimmick.”

“A gimmick?” Boxman looked at him over his shoulder. “It’s a really nice piece of technology. I mean, the charger isn’t the best, but other than that, it’s great. What else do you need?”

“Superpowers,” Laser bit his lip, pulse suddenly drumming in his ears.

“Oh. Do you have to have any?” Boxman shuffled to face him.

“Of course. I’m a superhero. It’s kind of part of the description.”

“Really? You need superpowers for that?” Boxman looked genuinely taken aback and poked a talon to his (plump, outrageously kissable) lips. “I’m pretty sure that villains, or even supervillains, are not required to have any.”

“I lost mine,” Laserblast forced himself to say, and it came out more roughly than he’d meant. “In the donut shop incident. That’s what started… this whole mess I’m in.” He was sure his heart would leap out of his chest while he waited for Boxman to say anything to his confession.

“Were they any good?”

“They sucked. I was able to drain power from… stuff. They were pretty useless, as far as superpowers went, and I hated them. But now that they‘re gone...”

“Oooh!” Boxman punched his fist on his palm. “So that’s why your helmet was like that! You didn’t really need a charger except as a backup plan.”

Laser nodded.

“Pffft,” Boxman went, as if what he’d just heard was no big deal. “Good riddance, if you ask me! I don’t have any powers, and I’m doing fine. Great, actually! Almost all supervillains I know don’t have powers. In fact, just wait until you get a load of this next guy!”

Laser stared silently at the beaming, wind-kissed face of the bouncy villain and after a moment, slithered closer and wrapped his arms around his soft, warm middle. For flight safety, of course. 

* * *

Laser’s eyes narrowed at the sight of the gaudy, gaudy yacht and the party happening on it.

“That wouldn’t happen to be Gazilliam Milliam’s scion over there, would it?”

“His name’s Billiam Milliam, so maybe?” Boxman eyed him suspiciously. “Are you sure you’re from NRC? You seem to know the local villains better than I do.”

“I know his dad from NRC,” Laser smirked, phone already out and making a video. “And man, is Old Gaz going to have _feelings_ about what his golden baby boy is doing while he should be holed up in his poison ivy league university for his exams.”

“You’re going to blackmail Billiam before you’ve even met him?” Boxman looked torn between shock and adoration. “Are you _sure-sure_ you’re a hero?”

“Some villainous infighting never hurt a hero,” Laser grinned. “I’m still undecided about the blackmail, though. Too much work. Maybe I’ll just email this to his dad for the heck of it.”

“Let me do a fly-by to give you a better angle,” Boxman matched his grin.

* * *

“Oh, hello there!” a young, rather golden-looking guy with a bubbly apple cider flute waved at them from the upper deck of the yacht. “I was wondering when you’d get here!”

“You were?” Boxman shouted down suspiciously and hovered just above him. Laser popped up next to him.

“Oooh, helllllo there~” Billiam drawled in a completely different tone of voice as his eyes target-locked on the hero. “And who might you be, my dear, _dear_ boy?” He leaned seductively on the deck railing and toasted them with his flute. “And are you here on business or _pleasure_ ~” he giggled. “I hope it’s pleasure.”

“Hey! You never ask me that!” Boxman chimed in and attempted to land the desk on top of him. Billiam dodged and lounged against another railing.

Laser, who had had much worse directed at him from the time he was 12-16 years old, casually hopped off the desk, stuck his hands in his test-tube-ready pockets and assumed his casual pose #22-B ‘Oh, I didn’t notice _at all_ that there were paparazzi over there,’ with the cocked hip. Billiam drooled a little.

“A friend of Big Bull Demon’s, eh?” Laser asked. “Then you know why we’re here. So? Do you have him?”

“Nope,” Billiam shook his head and shrugged happily. “Why would I want him? Personally, I love Cobsmas. My dad is getting me a new tropical island this year, and I have my eye on several race-unicorns to populate its stables.”

“And why should we trust you?” Boxman pointed a finger at him with accusation. “You would never own up to it even if you had the old man!”

“He’s right, you know,” Laser nodded towards Boxman.

“Well, be my guests, grab a glass, search around,” Billiam offered and then added with half-lidded eyes still target-locked on Laser, “you in particular are _always_ welcome to frisk me. Let’s go somewhere more private and get started right away, shall we?”

Oh, great, Laser thought. It had been two entire days since some rando asked him for a strip-search. He was really nailing this whole incognito business.

“There will be NO frisking on my watch!” Boxman, fluffed up to almost double his size, marched on Billiam with murder in his eye, but Laser put a protective hand in front of him. 

He took out one of the test-tubes out of his pocket, tossed it casually in the air and caught it. To his slight surprise, Billiam’s eyes immediately shifted from his lower waist area to the tube in his hand. Huh.

“If you heard the details from Big Bull Demon, you must know what this does to metals. Including… what’s that? Gold plate facial graft?”

“There’s no need to threaten me, darling,” Billiam said and he sounded a lot more business-like than a moment ago. “I don’t have your Mr. Claus, and neither do I care about him. However, if you ever feel like selling _that_ patent” and he pointed to the test-tube with his glass, “or at least signing an exclusive production contract, do ring me up first. I’m _very_ rich, I promise I can make it worth your while.”

“Are you...” Laser blinked. This was definitely new, at least coming from a villain, “...offering me a job?”

“A business partnership, _mon cheri_ ,” Billaim said and approached him with a business card and a wink. “I did ask if you were here on business or pleasure.”

Laser, never taking his eyes off him, took the offered card. “Is that so,” he said with calculation in his voice and looked carefully down at the smiling man, who was now practically flush against him. 

“Indeed,” Billiam nodded and tilted his head up, holding the hero’s gaze for a long moment, one finger trailing lightly up his coat sleeve.

“ENOUGH OF THAT!!” Boxman shouted, grabbed Laser by the waist, chucked him onto the desk, and proceeded to empty its whole light missile array at the gaudy yacht. 

Billiam’s anti-missile shield caught the worst of the damage, but hey, it was the thought that counted, right?

* * *

“If you’re not going to email that video to Billy-nilly’s dad, send it to me! I will!” Boxman fumed.

“No, no, I will, don’t you worry,” Laser said absently, turning the business card in his hand.

“Hey Laser?” Boxman asked after a bit of fumbling with their list of villains and adjusting the desk’s course. “Whyyyy are you going around punching people for a living if you’re so...” and he waved a hand at the other man.

“I’m so what?” Laser asked defensively.

“Well, you have a PhD, you can make potions that make goo clones and melt metals like ice-cream and explode and who knows what else, and even made a helmet that can shoot lasers! You don’t _need_ to punch anyone.”

“Well… I mean… writing scientific articles is right up there with running a barber shop in terms of heroism. There’s a reason mad scientists tend to be evil.”

“And sane ones?”

“Sane ones?” Laser asked pointedly. “You didn’t stay in academia for very long, did you?” 

Boxman rolled his eyes and went on.

“Seriously, villains would eat up that stuff you make like hot cakes. Why wouldn’t you do anything with all that? There’s an endless market out there waiting for you.”

“I...” Laser hesitated, taken aback. “Well, I do like bioengineering, but… trust me, villains are a market I have never once considered in my life.”

“Well, now _the market_ is considering _you_. Billy-Willy is a spoiled brat, but he has been investing a lot in evil businesses. He even asked about buying shares of Boxmore.”

“Huh,” Laser said, looking at the business card again. “So there’s a whole evil economy out there? I should probably… look into it.”

“Look down there first!” Boxman pointed and dipped the desk down.

“Some sort of… ruins? Does anyone live there?”

“They’re perfect for haunting! Vormulax has really been embracing her ghoul heritage lately. What, no ghouls and grey aliens in NRC?”

“Plenty,” Laser said dryly. “One grey alien in particular has been on my case ever since I had a case to be on.”

“It seems empty, though,” Boxman commented under his breath. “Usually, you get all sorts of things lurking around the ruins...”

They landed the desk in a clearing surrounded by picturesque, snow-topped broken columns and an eerie twisted tree made even eerier with the help of a few glittery corn ornaments.Their steps echoed in the cold winter breeze going through the whole ruined palace.

“Maaaybe BBD called Laxy as well?” Boxman offered hesitantly. “Normally, she’d turn up right away whenever I drop by to try to kick me out...”

“Or maybe she has Mr. Claus?” Laser, who had been fighting villains for a long time, touched the remainder of the test-tubes in his pocket and vest.

“I don’t think she even celebrates Cobsmas...”

“I do, Lad,” a new voice echoed from behind a toppled statue and one purple apparition drifted out into view. “In fact, I have a whole little party of friends over, to help me do something really memorable this Cobsmas.” 

“Oh, that’s nice!” Boxman smiled. “I love wrecking parties! When do we start?”

“Right NOW!” Vormulax shouted, and an entire battalion of low- and mid-level villains with guns at the ready cropped out from every available surface of the ruins. Laser sighed internally and noted that many had visible bandages and black eyes.

“I see you met Sunshine and her heroes, eh?” he tossed while trying to assess the situation.

“And I see you’re running out of ammo, _hero_. Let’s see if you’re good for anything other than photoshoots,” Vormulax grinned.

“About earlier, Boxman,” Laser said, no veins at all popping on his forehead, “punching people and wrecking stuff does have its merits. There’s a lot to be said about it, in fact.”

“I see your point!” Boxman grinned an produced and honest-to-cob flamethrower from the recesses of his all-powerful desk. “Let’s roast ‘em!”

* * *

Laserblast and Boxman splatted against the wall of an old barn, oof-ed, and fell straight into the giant compost heaps below.

Boxman emerged first and fretted when he didn’t see his partner in crime anywhere. He called for him and worriedly squinted back up the barn wall and down at the few startled pigs that had been eyeing the compost.

“Oh, cobdang no,” he fumed. “Oh, he’s going to be furious… Laser! Are you alive!”

“Oh yes!” the heap next to Boxman cheered. “More than ever!”

An utterly filthy Laserblast emerged from the compost like a stinky Venus emerging from the waves, to Boxman’s wide-eyed shock.

“It’s been _ages_ since I had a good, straightforward fight without worrying about who’s winning and how my helmet is doing!” he punch-kicked the air. “I love getting my hands dirty!”

“Well, we definitely accomplished that,” Boxman continued to stare.

“Oh, Boxy,” Laser sighed and fell back on the soft compost, looking absolutely smitten. “You were right, you villains really do have all the fun.”

“See!” Boxman grinned wide and shook a wise finger. “You don’t need some stupid superpowers to have power! And you certainly don’t need them to have _fun_!”

“Yeah,” Laser hugged him and he really, really would have kissed him too, if his inner biologist wasn’t screaming at him the latin names of every germ that they both were fully covered with. “Thank you, Boxy. It’s been the best day I’ve had since… I don’t remember when.”

“You’re welcome,” Boxman said happily, smearing something on Laser’s shirt with his cheek. “Now let’s go shower.”

“Together?” Laser asked innocently.

“There’s also the industrial incinerator, very handy for disinfecting stuff.”

“Separately it is~”

* * *

Laser knew he really had to care more about the fact that the personification of Cobsmas, Mr. Claus, had been gone for three days after being left in his charge, he really did. 

But he was stuffed full of blunch, freshly scrubbed, dressed in one of Boxman’s sweaters that was too big for him, and playing with the baby bots on the floor by the cheerful fire of the small forge. And Boxman was there, too, regaling the bots with tales of their daring raids of the other villains’ lairs. He felt warm and content all the way through. The only thing missing was Fink.

“Speaking of whom...” he reached out for his phone and tried turning it on again. It had gotten damaged during their farming adventure, but Boxman had done some magic on it.

It started ringing as soon as he turned it on. He sighed. He should have known that it was too good to last.

“Hey, Sparks. How’s it going?”

“Laser! Finally! Why weren’t you picking up? I was worried about you!”

“What’s wrong? Is it Fink?”

“Fink is fine! Well, she chewed through Dr. Greyman’s entire latest philosophy dissertation draft, but other than that, she’s fine. _You_ , on the other hand, are all over the news!”

“Me?” Laser blinked. “When did I manage? I’m not even in NRC.”

“Oh, don’t give me that! _You lost Mr. Claus_!? _That’s_ why you’ve been staying behind in Lakewood!? Why didn’t you say anything!?”

“Dang nosy Dynamite What’s-her-face,” Boxman mumbled.

“I told you that I have it under control. We’re looking everywhere, and all the local heroes are on it. I even got some help from, erm, the villainous community. Nobody can do anything we haven’t already done.” _Probably_ , he added in his head.

“But why didn’t you at least say anything?” Carol sounded exasperated. “And there I thought you had met some lovely young single parent with a holiday-spirited little girl in that quaint little town and were learning all about the true spirit of Cobsmas and were shacked up at-”

Laser needed to mute the phone for a moment while Carol presented her version of events and he seethed quietly. What was it with everyone and… he paused. His eyes met those of the single young parent Boxman. Then they darted to the mysterious orange bot.

“Are you a girl?” he asked.

“I am Shannon!” the bot shouted. “I’m a girl!”

Laser stood frozen for a moment and then shook his head vehemently. No, no, no, no, he had not heard anything.

“More importantly, Sparks,” he unmuted and interrupted her. “Can you tell me what happened to El Bow after that incident. You know? While Fink and I were in hospital.”

“El Bow?” The name seemed to have startled her out of her rom-com screenwriting workshop. “He… he went missing. He got blamed for everything that happened, before you had a chance to explain. Foxtail fired him, and he just… disappeared.” She gasped. “Laser, have you found out anything about him?”

“I...” he pinched the bridge of his nose. “Look, it’s hard to explain on the phone. Why didn’t I know any of that?”

“Well, you never asked,” she said and paused. “And I guess I also… found it hard to talk about him. Especially to you.”

“Oh,” Laser said simply. 

It occurred to him that he really should have looked harder at the people around him.

“He was the sweetest man I ever met, and he didn’t deserve what happened to him,” Carol said quietly and added, “Laser, if you know anything, please let me know! I’m so worried about him. About both of you.”

“I will. Have Foxtail and Greyman seen the news, too?”

“I don’t see how they could have missed it,” Carol said tersely. “Are you sure you have it under control? POINT will be held responsible if anything happened, and Congress has called, too. Right now, it’s just Rippy and me here at HQ, and I don’t know what to tell them. Or anyone.”

“Just maintain that everything’s under control, and we can’t release further details because it's an ongoing investigation, and all that maize. You know the script.”

“Are you sure?”

“Sparks, for the n-th time...”

“Alright, alright,” she huffed. “You don’t need help. Got it.”

“Thanks. And say thanks to Rippy, too.”

“Please, take care, Laser,” she added more softly. “This whole superhero business isn’t worth losing so many people I care about.”

“I will,” he said and disconnected. Then he stared at the phone and added darkly, “Congress, eh. Cob dang it.”

Silence reigned for a while, not broken even by the bots who had picked up on his dark mood. Finally, Boxman shuffled and produced from some hidden recess of his workshop desk a cherry sucker that he handed to the somber hero.

“Thanks.”

Laser popped it in his mouth and leaned back against the armchair Boxman had dragged to the forge. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to hold on to the warmth and peace of the moment.

“I think...” he stared and had to take a deep breath. “I think I’ll have to go back to Neo Riot City tomorrow. This has gotten completely out of my hands.”

“But...” Ernesto rolled to him and hugged his shin. “Don’t you wive here now?”

“No, buddy,” Laser tried to smile and petted the bot. “I was just staying here while we look for Mr. Claus.”

“What will you do in that city?” Shannon, who had been chewing on Boxman’s sweater sleeve, also trotted over.

“I really have no idea what will happen once I go back,” he explained and snuck a look at Boxman, who was looking back at him. 

“I am Jethro.”

“Good for you,” Laser said. “I wish I was, too.”

“We’re going to miss youuuuuu!!” Darrell bawled and barrelled straight into his chest.

“I’ll miss you, too,” Laser replied and gathered all the bots to himself.

“Hey now, cheer up everyone!” Boxman clapped after a moment. “A vill-, er, a hero has to do what a hero has to do and-”

“I hate heroes!” Darrell shouted and hugged the hero tighter.

“-and so why don’t you give him the drawings you just made and go to bed?”

The bots had all drawn a touching Cobsmas scene of one Santa bonking another Santa on the head and either robbing or seducing him behind a row of bored-looking elves, some corny decorations and a few gift boxes. Laser supposed that it was probably very fitting for aspiring young villains. Maybe. He could believe anything at this point.

“And I made you this,” Boxman shyly shoved a blue paper his way and blushed one of the most disgustingly adorable tiny blushes Laser had ever seen. “It’s nothing, really, just a sketch. Since you seemed to have trouble with your charger. So I designed you a better one...” he mumbled.

“Thank you, Boxy. And thank you guys, too,” Laser said and smiled at all of them. They made a sight he wanted very much to remember well.

* * *

After the bots had been herded off to bed, Laser collected the drawings, got up and stretched his tired muscles a bit. His wound pulled and he winced.

“Hey Boxman, can I borrow some bandages? I ran out.”

“Oh.” Boxman looked up at his shoulder. “Is that the one I...”

“No, that’s the one Foxtail’s tails gave me, technically,” Laser chuckled. “You know, when I landed in a POINT action figurine case. I had to remove the old ones because of our farm-diving experience..”

“And you didn’t put on fresh ones? How do you heroes even stay alive?” Boxman rolled his eyes. “Come, I’ll help you,” he grabbed his hand and led him to his own room.

Laser tried not to stare too much. He hadn’t seen the place before, and it was both startling and exactly what he had expected it to be. It reminded him of those bower birds that collected all sorts of colorful junk around their nests. He also tried not to get his hopes up. Boxy was just going to help him with the bandage. That was all.

“Come on, clothes off,” Boxman chirped and came out of the bathroom with a few first aid items. The demand did not help at all with getting Laser’s mind out of the gutter, but he obeyed and sat on the edge of the bed in order to be at Boxman’s eye level.

“Does it look fine?” he asked when Boxman inspected it.

“It’s V-shaped.”

“I meant, is it healing well?” he huffed a small laugh.

“I think so. Now stay put, I’ll clean it once, just in case...”

He did stay put while Boxman expertly dealt with the wound. Laser realized that as someone who ran a factory essentially by himself and had a metal faceplate, Boxman had to be extremely good with all sorts of injuries. He usually tended to his own by himself, if they weren’t serious enough to need a doctor, but it was definitely nice to have someone else do it for him.

“You know, I used to know a hero,” Boxman started as if he had something on his mind. “Years ago. They tried to get me to give up villainy.”

“Ouch,” Laser chuckled. “I wish I had seen how _that_ went down for them.”

“Don’t you people do that all the time? Try to get villains to turn good?”

“I’ve never done it. I may have said something like that because heroes generally are expected to, but for me it’s more about...” he sought for the right diplomatic word “ _plausible deniability_ before I kick their butts. I don’t know what I’d do if one went and actually took me up on it. Kick their butt anyway, probably.”

Boxman snickered.

“I really hate heroes,” he added in a moment, finishing up dressing the wound.

“Honestly, I understand the feeling.”

“So normally, I have a strict ‘no heroes’ policy,” Boxman stated and put his hands on his hips, surveying Laser’s shoulder as if it was a freshly finished artwork.

“Huh? How do you mean?” Laser’s brows furrowed. Had he missed something?

“But I think I’m about to break it. Yeah,” Boxman nodded to himself and added, “if you’re still interested, that is.”

Laser blinked while the cogs turned and clicked in his head.

Then he grinned wide and pounced.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, the season to be jolly (while getting his hands dirty) finally reached our bb Laser, huh? >]
> 
> Will he go to NRC? Will he find Mr. Claus? Will he sail into the sunset with Billiam on his shiny yacht!?   
> And incidentally, whatever happened to that grilled-corn-whacked magic!?


	7. Cobsmas Miracles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I believe this image to be self-explanatory. XD  
>    
> Enjoy!

♪♪♪ On the sixth day of Cobsmas, my baby gave to me six amazing days ♪♪♪

* * *

Laserblast had always been very suspicious of people who said things like ‘one fine morning I woke up and everything had changed.’

But it was a fine and festive morning, and he woke up warm and happy in Boxman’s bed, and everything had changed for him. 

He watched a grumbling, sleepy Boxman crawl out of bed to the sounds of some commotion somewhere in the factory and couldn’t imagine ever waking up, or going to sleep, anywhere else. His life in Neo Riot City seemed like a long and convoluted dream, and even though he knew that the reality of it would hit him soon enough, he buried his face in the pillow where Boxman had just been and basked in the warm sense of belonging he felt.

After a while, his phone started ringing and beeping with the daily morning reports of the local heroes and he lazily scrolled through them. He wasn’t surprised to find nothing of real interest. It would have been too much to expect some last-moment great breakthrough to save him from the need to go back to NRC - he was pretty sure he had to be on Mr. Claus’s naughty list anyway, after having lost him like loose change, so no Cobsmas miracles for him.

And Cob, it really was Cobsmas tomorrow, wasn’t it? He would have to leave Boxman alone on Cobsmas eve, of all nights. Although he had never cared for the holiday, it felt like a particularly horrible thing to do. He rubbed his face and sighed. At least he’d get to see Fink soon. At least there was that.

Cob almighty, he didn’t want to leave.

He wistfully took the five drawings that he’d ended up bringing with him the previous night and stared at them absently. Fink would have had a blast playing with the bots. Just like he and Boxman had a blast… doing anything and everything together.

In Shannon’s drawing, one Santa cheerfully bonked another Santa on the head. Laser blinked.

* * *

“Boxman!” Laser ran down the stairs and sprinted in the direction of the other’s voice. “Boxy, I’ve got it! Take a look at-”

He screeched to a halt at the sight of three really, really wide-eyed people and four giggly bots.

Then, he remembered that he was only wearing underwear.

_And then_ , he realized that in his haste he had pulled on not even his own, but Boxman’s, and that it was brightly patterned with the Boxmore logo.

The cumulus hero, Sunshine, was blushing so brightly that several rainbows had formed around her clouds. The bonked man, as Laser had dubbed him in his head, was slack-jawed and already taking pictures on his phone. The baby bots were laughing and pointing at him. Boxman was holding them up and facepalming with a lot of feeling.

“I- It’s not- We-” Laser stammered, placing strategically the drawings he had been clutching.

“Congratulations, sir!” Sunshine chirped, looking straight ahead. “Good for you! Honestly, you looked like you needed it.”

Laser sputtered speechlessly and blushed all the way to his chest. His very, very naked chest.

“Apropos of nothing at all, sir,” Sunshine went on, “I’ve been meaning to ask you for a recommendation letter to POINT. I heard that there’s been an opening ever since one of your junior members got sacked. I’ve learned so much about _charisma_ from you! And we’re already _working together_ _so very well_ on this case, _aren’t we, sir_?”

Boxman cackled in the background while it was Laser’s turn to stare slack-jawed. Then he grinned.

“Yeah, sure, why not. I think you and POINT deserve each other,” he added. “Why are you here? Did you also find out that this guy has the solution to our problem?”

“Well,” Sunshine seemed taken aback by having her grand surprise anticipated, “actually yes. He says that-”

“Yes, yes, he got bonked on the head and robbed at his part-time job at the mall.”

“Hey,” the man intoned, “I’m right here, you know!”

“How did you know?” Sunshine’s eyes widened, some admiration sneaking in.

“But what he didn’t say is what exactly his part-time job _was_!” Laser said triumphantly. “And now I’ve figured it out!”

“Oh, for Cob’s sake, I tried to tell you on _three_ separate occasions!” the man exploded. “If only you heroes would stop for literally ten seconds and _listen_!”

“Sir, you can be charged with obstruction of justice for not sharing such important information in a timely manner,” Sunshine chided him. “I’ll put in a good word for you, but it’s decidedly un-civic of you.”

The man roared in frustration. Darrell reached over and patted him on the head consolingly.

“Anyway, let’s go!” Laser exclaimed and Sunshine cheered in agreement.

“Not before you shower and put on some of your own pants!” Boxman shouted and grabbed him by the Boxmore briefs before he could run off.

* * *

The united festive crowds of The Better Lakewood Mall prepared their phone cameras as soon as the flying desk crashed through the glass dome above the mall’s living Cobsmas tree, landed in front of the Santa display to the dismay of the part-timer elves, and unloaded Laserblast, Boxman and his bazooka, four cheering baby bots, Sunshine, and a harassed-looking old man.

Boxman bounced into action first and jumped right at the man in the Santa suit, who tried to scamper unsuccessfully.

“Here!” Boxman dragged him to the heroes. “Is this him?”

“I don’t know, this looks fake to me...” Sunshine reached out and pulled off the fake beard. It revealed a second, real beard, that was somehow even fluffier than the first.

“Yes, that’s him,” Laserblast said darkly. “Mr. Claus, you have a lot to explain.”

“And no trying to weasel out of it!” Boxman added and casually pointed the bazooka at him. “We already know that you ran away on your own. We have witnesses!” and he pointed to the baby bots that had gathered and were clutching his trouser legs again.

“For the last time, I’m here, too!” the unfortunate part-timer shouted. “I’m the _victim_ here!”

“Yes, my dear friend,” Mr. Claus said soulfully and squeezed his shoulder. The man looked shocked at finally being acknowledged. “And I’m sorry for what I was forced to do to you. Believe me, it was not my first choice, or even my fifth. But I needed to leave, and this superhero here,” and he pointed to Laserblast, “was watching me like a hawk!”

“No, I-” Laser caught himself. “Er. Of course I was. It’s my job.” Then, he elbowed the pink-cheeked, sniggering Boxman.

“I couldn’t take a step away without him knowing about it and finding me! I don’t know how he did it.” Mr. Claus gave a dramatic sigh and shook his head. “I guess I chose too well when I chose him.”

“You know you could have just explained who you were!” the other old man said. “I love Cobsmas and I would have loved to help you with anything I can! I volunteered for that job in the first place because I love the holidays so much and wanted to help bring the Cobsmas spirit to everyone!”

“Oh!” Mr. Claus gave him a tearful look. “What’s your name, my good man?”

“It’s Kris.”

“Well Kris, you really helped me out. These have been the best three days of my life in... I can't remember how long! Working in your place has been a joy! No pressure! No stress! No magic performance anxiety! And best of all,” Mr. Claus leaned in and winked conspiratorially. “It was the parents of the kids that supplied the presents all along! Can you believe it!?”

“Erm. Well yes, quite easily.”

“Oh, Cob’s popcorn!” Laser swore. “And you staged this whole circus just because you had ‘magic performance anxiety’!? Couldn’t you just, I don’t know, read a self-help book or something?”

“Aaah, my perfect, charismatic hero,” Mr. Claus exclaimed even more dramatically and leaned against Laser, whose eye twitched. “You couldn’t possibly understand this, but it’s not as simple as all that. The truth of the matter is that my Cobsmas magic has been leaving me. It’s almost completely gone now.”

Everyone gasped in horror. 

“YA-HOOOOO!” Boxman went, and happily tossed his bazooka in the air. The bots imitated him and cheered, too. “Ha-hah! Take that, you heroes! There is no more magic! There will be no Cobsmas, and no Mr. Claus! Yes! I’ve done it!”

“You have… _lost your powers_ ,” Laser said very, very quietly and for the first time, took a good look at Mr. Claus. “What happened to you?”

Boxman, who had heard him, threw him a worried look between cheers.

“Nothing happened,” Mr. Claus said, and for the first time Laser saw in him just an old man who was trying to make the best of his life. “I just don’t believe in Cobsmas anymore. Not really. I’ve lived with its magic for so long that I stopped seeing it as something magical. I’m not Santa anymore, I’m not the personification of Cobsmas. I’m just... someone who continues to act as one while on the inside, I’m already someone else. And the True Spirit of Cobsmas knows this.” He took a look around at the shocked and surprised faces around him. “Oh, don’t be like that. The magic still exists, somewhere out there. It’s just that for me, it’s time for a change.”

Laserblast listened to Mr. Claus in awe and wonder, and it seemed to him that the whole world had just been turned inside out. The words were enchanting, reaching into him like the fabled Cobsmas magic, and he reached out for Boxman’s hand. He found it, and the sharp talons squeezed back.

“Good,” he heard Boxman say. “Off you go then. Shoo.”

“Oh, not just yet, my pithy lad,” Mr. Claus grinned. “There has to be _one_ final Cobsmas miracle. A last spark of magic to crown my time as the personification of Cobsmas, and I wanted to see it through.”

“Oh, _bother_ ,” Boxman rolled his eyes and hoisted the bazooka again. “Think very carefully about what it’s going to be. I don’t want to see anything heroic!”

“Well, in fact, I already chose my last miracle. And _you_ were to receive it, my fine hero,” Mr. Claus turned around and pointed at Laserblast.

“Oooh, no you don’t!” Boxman shouted and aimed at him, hopping protectively in front of Laser. “You stay away from him! Don’t you dare try to mess with his head!”

“My, how _heroically_ valiant you are!” Mr. Claus praised the sputtering Boxman with a glint in his eye. “But you’re too late. I already performed the magic I had prepared for him, on the night before we came to Lakewood.”

That shook Laser out of his stupor. With sudden, horrifying clarity, he knew what Mr. Claus’s last Cobsmas miracle had been. For the time it took his eyes to widen in shock, all of the times someone had talked at him about being shown the True Spirit of Cobsmas by the single parent of a holiday-spirited little girl had flashed in his mind’s eye. 

No. No, it couldn’t be. It was way too monstrous to be true.

He had _not_ fallen in love with Boxman just because of some misguided Cobsmas miracle. No!

_Oh._

_..._

_He had fallen in love with Boxman._

He looked at the adorable, round force of nature standing protectively in front of him with his bazooka, and at his kids, currently chewing on Mr. Claus’s shins. He remembered the scar on his shoulder, and the blunches, and the blankets, and the ciders, and the drawings he had safely stashed in his wallet, and the last six amazing days that they had spent together. They were real. They had to be real. They had to be, because he said so.

They _were_ real. Because he felt so.

“Boxy, it’s alright,” he put a hand on Boxman’s shoulder and pulled him to himself. He was proud of how even and natural his voice came out. “He hasn’t done anything to me.”

“But he just said-”

“No, Laserblast is right,” Mr. Claus shook his head sadly.

“Huh?”

“My final miracle never worked,” Mr. Claus said. “I waited, and waited for the magic to kick in, so I could see it, but it never did.” He rubbed his hands with a wistful smile. “It was just another proof that my magic has left me and it was time to quietly disappear from the scene. I realized that whatever miracle I had performed before that one, had been my last. Honestly, I wish I could remember which one it was, but I’m sure that it must have been a good one. I took my time crafting my miracles, you know. Made them really count.”

Kris applauded and wiped a tear from the corner of his eye.

Laser very, very surreptitiously sighed in relief. Boxman looked up at him, and he gave him his warmest smile. The tiny little blush it caused was lovely.

“Erm, sir?” Sunshine chimed in. “Isn’t this the moment when you give him the rousing speech about how he should stick to his calling, and _not_ let him discuss his retirement plans?”

“Nope,” Laser said cheerfully. “And if you still need that recommendation letter, you won’t either.”

Boxman snickered, and it was one of the most beautiful sounds Laser had ever heard. In a flash of inspiration, he knew what he was going to do next.

But first, he wanted to ask one last thing…

“But if you’re not going to be Santa anymore, what are you going to be?” he asked the man who had caused so much to happen to him, directly or not. “How can you just go and decide something like that, after having been the personification of Cobsmas your whole life? There’s so much hope and expectation pinned on you.”

“I told you, I didn’t just go and decide it!” Mr. Claus exclaimed. “I’m simply not that anymore, and my waning magic is proof of that. I may not be the noble and generous Santa anymore, but I can be a noble and generous something else! I don’t yet know, myself! Maybe I’m going to be a, a, a teacher! Yeah! Open a school! Or something.” He waved his hands excitedly, and Laser laughed, surprising even himself. “Honestly, I don’t know, but I mean to find out! And by the way, young man, maybe you too should use this magical time of change and rebirth to choose something, or _someone_ , brand-new?” Mr. Claus winked mischievously. “C’mon, buddy! It’s almost Cobsmas! Go wild! Do what your heart tells you to do!”

“By Cob’s shank, you’re right for once!” Laser grinned, grabbed Boxman and turned him towards himself.

Boxman’s eyes went heart-shaped as Laser fell down on one knee and passionately grabbed Boxy’s mismatched hands in his own.

“Yes, Boxy! I want you... to show me how to be _a villain_! I want to be evil with you!!”

“What!?” went Mr. Claus.

“WUT!?” went Boxman.

“HWUOAT!?” went Carol.

“Boss!” went Fink, tucked under Carol’s arm like a football.

“Oh, my Cob,” whispered one of the congress troops behind Carol and took out their phone camera.

* * *

Magic is amazing, but it’s only that - magic. It’s not very smart, it springs up in the most unexpected and impractical places, rarely turns up when you need it the most, and certainly doesn’t understand when it’s been whacked several times with an equally magical ear of grilled corn.

But it’s very good at doing its job, no matter what shape it may be in - and that is clinging to those it touches and subtly (or not so subtly) changing their world, bit by bit. The magic of that Cobsmas, for example, would keep returning to those who had experienced it and make them smile and chuckle and remember a fun time in their lives, and make these lives a bit better for that.

And magic clings even to those who don’t perceive it as such - like superheroes who hate the holidays, or people who perform so much magic that they forget what’s magical about it, or little children, for whom the whole world is still magical anyway. 

For example, that Cobsmas, one little pink baby rat was so tightly wrapped in corn-whacked magic that for those who could see it, she was practically a tangled sphere of glowing miracles. She didn’t know that, but as she grew up, she couldn’t stop meeting cheerful little girls, all of them with single parents, and making friends with them. Around Cobsmas in particular her list of contacts grew exponentially, until, by her late teens, she could swear she knew each and every kid of a single parent in the entire Neutral Zone. 

She never questioned that, but her adoptive fathers tended to grumble about meddling old men, especially while they organized birthday parties with 1000+ attendees.

* * *

That little pink baby rat, named Fink, was also the first one to break the tableau that The Better Lakewood Mall had turned into. She wiggled out of the grip of the shocked Carol, scuttered on all fours to Laser, climbed up his uniform and squeezed his neck in a hug.

“Boss! Oh, boss, I missed you so much!” she nuzzled under his chin. “You’re never going anywhere again, boss!”

“I missed you too, Fink,” Laser said, not letting Carol and the troops out of his sight. “Now meet Boxman and play nice with him for a bit, alright? Boss has juuust a little more unfinished business.”

“Eeep,” squeaked both Fink and Boxman as she was gently shoved in his hands, almost causing him to drop the bazooka. He tried to hold her by the scruff and she tried to bite his hand, but only managed his sleeve.

“Baby!” Darrell and Ernesto exclaimed, delighted.

“Sparks, why in Cob’s name have you dragged congress troops here?” he got up from his knees and decided to go on the offensive first. “I told you over and over again that I had it under control.”

“First of all, _they_ dragged _me_ , because you wouldn’t explain things properly!” Carol waved her arm at the entertained troops. “You lost Mr. Claus, did you think Congress wouldn’t take an interest!?”

“I didn’t lose him!” Laser shouted and pointed at the old man. “Look, he’s right here! See!?”

“Hello!” Mr. Claus waved distractedly, his eyes glued to Boxman and Fink, who were growling at each other.

“And you wouldn’t say what you’ve found out about Eugene!”

“Who?” Laser blinked and at seeing her murderous expression, he remembered in a hurry. “Oh. Him. Did you come here for him?”

“I told you, I came to back you up!” Carol fumed. “Because I didn’t want you to have to deal with congress and everything alone! And when I arrive here, what do I see, Laser? _What_!?”

“Well, didn’t you hear? Cobsmas is a ‘magical time of change and rebirth,’ apparently,” Laser growled. “And here I am, changing.”

“A _villain_!?” Carol waved her arms in utter exasperation. “Not even an antihero? Just, straight up, done and done, _villain_!? You’re the most charismatic superhero of our generation, what in the world happened to you?”

“What does that even mean?” Laser shouted. “It’s just a fancy way of saying ‘good at smoke and mirrors, has a nice butt’!”

Next to him, Sunshine gasped and teared up. “No! Charisma is so important! Charisma is what separates sparkling heroes from amateurs!”

“It’s-”

“STOP, everyone!” Mr. Claus ordered, and in the manner of semi-magical personifications everywhere, his voice carried through the whole mall and everyone went silent.

“All is not lost,” he announced, and even though nobody present knew what “it” was supposed to be, they believed him. “I suppose you cannot see it, but my last miracle actually worked. It’s right there!”

And he pointed at Fink, who was currently chewing on Boxman’s faceplate. She stopped and looked from Mr. Claus to her boss in alarm. She had no way of knowing that to Mr. Claus, she looked like a disco-ball of magic and realized ambition.

“My magic is doing fine! It’s, erm, a bit… weirdly shaped, but it’s _sparkling_!” he cheered. “And that means that the True Spirit of Cobsmas is still with me! It’s not over! I can still perform my last miracle the way it was meant to be performed, and see it through the way it should be!”

Kris applauded again, looking absolutely ecstatic at the news. He seemed to be just about the only one among the confused crowd.

“Come here, my fine, heroic lad, and you, give me that baby rat for a sec-” Mr. Claus started and turned to Laserblast, already rubbing his hands together.

Boxman with Fink on his shoulder stepped back and pointed the bazooka at him.

“No, thanks,” Laser also took a step back. “I don’t want it. I don’t believe in Cobsmas, or its miracles.”

“That doesn’t matter, dearest,” Mr. Claus advanced with a slightly manic glint in his eyes. “The world needs to have a Cobsmas miracle, and a miracle it will have, if it’s the last thing I do!”

“Oh, no you won’t!” Laser barked and took another step back. “My love for Boxman is completely real, and it’s _mine_ , and I don’t want any magic or miracles touching it!”

“Your _wut now_!?” Boxman croaked next to him and stared heart-eyed, pausing in the process of dislodging Fink from his bazooka.

“Oh. Ah. Ehem,” Laser explained eloquently and went as red as his visor. “Well, of course, erm, if that’s alright with you?”

The two of them gazed at each other for a long, charged moment.

“Er. Well. Wow,” Boxman finally replied with equal eloquence. “Yeah. Sure. Wow. _Really_?”

“Yes!?” Laser squeaked and then coughed in his hand. “I mean. Yes. Okay. Good to know. _Neat_.”

The two stared lovingly at each other for another moment.

“That’s very touching and all,” Mr. Claus interrupted their great romantic moment. “But you won’t deny me my miracle! Come on,” he added in a whiny tone, “if you already love each other, what’s one more miracle to top it off?”

“Yes, it’s important for Cobsmas!” Kris chimed in.

“You’re not laying a finger, or, er, or anything else on him!” Boxman shouted and pointed the bazooka with Fink hanging off its trigger at the two of them. Laser took a step back.

“Is everyone going to ignore the villain part?” Carol called from behind Mr. Claus. “Laser, we’ve been teammates for how long now? You owe me an explanation!”

“And you owe me a recommendation letter, while you’re still a hero!” an upset Sunshine stomped her foot, and Laser had to take another step back. 

“Laserblast, sir, Congress needs you to report on the situation asap,” the troops’ lieutenant chimed in. “We’re not sure how to proceed in this situation.”

“Daddy, daddy!” the four bots squealed. “We want to play with the baby, too!”

“I’m not a baby!” Fink shouted. “Tell ‘em, boss!”

“Hey,” someone in the crowd called. “If you’re handing out free miracles now, I want one! Can I volunteer?” The call was taken up by everyone else, offering themselves for Cobsmas miracles.

Laser took a wistful look at the flying desk, placidly waiting nearby, and shook his head to himself.

Then, Laserblast turned around and _ran_.

* * *

It was a wonderful afternoon at Lakewood Plaza Turbo, and Mr. Gar was happily shoveling the fresh snow that had fallen in the morning so that the merry shoppers could safely reach the bodega and the beautiful Cobsmas displays around it. His staff, who he was very proud of, were handing out pamphlets and discount coupons, and Mr. Logic was walking around checking if all of the corn decorations were in their perfect and most logical place.

Soon, it would start to get dark and people would start to go home for Cobsmas eve, he knew, but for now, the bodega was at its most festive. He enjoyed watching the people, some smiling, some harassed by late holiday shopping obligations, but all of them busily going on with their lives. The bodega and the other businesses at the plaza certainly made life better for many, and he felt warm and content, knowing this. It had been a hard, turbulent year, and he was glad to see that something good had come out of it.

He had not made any particular plans for the night, but Mr. Logic had invited him to spend Cobsmas eve with him and some young PhD student named Sphinxen and her baby daughter. Apparently, she was also new in Lakewood and had invited everyone who had nowhere else to be. He found that he was looking forward to it, in a quiet sort of way. He could use some peace and quiet in his life.

That was why Mr. Gar nearly had a heart attack when he stopped for a break and beheld none other than Laserblast himself running at full speed towards him.

“What in Cob’s popcorn!”

“You!” he heard Laser shout in the distance. “Don’t you dare move!”

A familiar flying desk appeared behind Laser, and on top of it - Boxman with a bazooka and what looked like a cheering pink blob on his head.

“Is he… being attacked?” Mr. Gar’s hero instincts kicked in and he ran a few paces, ready to help his former teammate.

Next, however, he saw a blue, sparkling, semi-transparent reindeer with a shiny red nose and what looked like not one, but two Santas on its back, shouting something indistinct. One of the Santas seemed to have some colorful spheres biting his shins.

Mr. Gar took off his glasses, cleaned them, rubbed his eyes, put the glasses back on, and stared. Nothing had changed.

“Mr. Logic!” he called. “Is that… Are you seeing...”

“Oh, my,” Mr. Logic trotted over. “Is that-”

A flash of lightning came next, and an extremely upset storm cloud followed, apparently trying to aim shots at either the hero or the villain. It was girl-shaped, and not very good at aiming.

“Hey, watch it! Some of us have metal gear!” someone shouted and…

“CAROL!?” Mr. Gar’s jaw dropped to the ground. He slapped himself a couple of times and then pinched himself. Was that really the love of his life running towards him? On Cobsmas eve?

After her, there came a whole platoon of what looked like Congress troops, if Mr. Gar remembered the uniform correctly.

And after them, there was a whole crowd of joggers he had never seen in his life, but who looked like normal Lakewood citizens. For a given value of normal, of course.

Laserblast screeched to a halt next to him, followed closely by the flying desk. To Mr. Gar’s continuous surprise, instead of starting a fight, the huffing hero leaned on the desk to catch his breath, and petted the pink rat on Boxman’s head with the cryptic order to “stay with Boxman and behave, alright?” 

However, Mr. Gar couldn’t care less about that, because…

“EUGENE!” Carol gasped and also screeched to a halt. “Oh my Cob, Eugene, you’re alive! You’re well! I found you!”

And with that, Mr. Gar had a pleasantly ruffled, warm, divine _Carol Kincaid_ throw herself on his neck and give him a bear hug. All of the Cobsmas magic that had ever existed exploded into fireworks around him and rained down pink hearts.

“C-C-Carol?” he stammered, “Did you come all the way here for _me_!?” 

“She sure did!!” Laserblast shouted before she could answer and jumped in front of the arriving crowds of cumulus heroes, old men on reindeer, troops, and athletically-inclined Lakewood citizens.

“There it is!” he went on and pointed at the two of them. “There’s your Cobsmas miracle! The woman who thought that the sweetest man she ever knew was gone forever, and the man who thought that the love of his life was with someone else!” Both Carol and Mr. Gar blushed brightly and exchanged bashful looks. “And they’re joined together in this _uuuugh_ quaint, festive town on Cobsmas eve! If that’s not a true Cobsmas miracle, I don’t know what is!”

The crowd awwed.

“Gene, I was so worried about you,” Carol said, deciding that she didn’t care about the audience. “Why did you disappear like that? We looked everywhere for you!”

“Well, F-Foxtail did sack me,” he managed, still blushing down at her.

“You know what Foxtail is like, you could have at least waited until she and Dr. Greyman had had a chance to talk it over with Laserblast. You disappeared in the worst possible moment!”

“B-but you also blamed me for what happened...”

“That was before I knew what Laser had done,” she shook her head. “But you’re right, I should have listened to you.”

“So you… you’re not mad at me anymore? And you and Laser...”

“No, I’m not. I’m very glad to see you alive and well. And yes, we broke up.”

“Did you r-really say I’m sweet?” Mr. Gar blushed even brighter.

“Did you really say I’m the love of your life?” Carol blushed brighter, too.

“Oh, Carol...”

“Gene...”

“Ok, this is adorable,” Mr. Claus wiped a tear from his eye, mirrored by Kris. “I have to admit, this really does make for a perfect Cobsmas miracle. Even if it wasn’t my magic that produced it, per se.”

“Magic?” Mr. Gar asked, confused.

“Hm, but if I understand it correctly,” Sunshine poked her cheek in thought, “your magic set in motion the chain of events that led to it. So it kind of did, indirectly.”

“Besides,” Kris chimed in, “it’s Cobsmas eve. Isn’t Cobsmas magic everywhere and in everyone tonight?”

“Oh, I suppose you’re right!” Mr. Claus said and hugged the two. “So this is it then! It’s official!”

“What is?” the troop lieutenant asked hesitantly. 

“This is my last grand Cobsmas miracle, and now that I’ve seen it through I can officially declare that I am not Santa anymore! I am just Mr. Claus, private citizen! Jolly Cobsmas, everyone!”

Everyone cheered, riding on the general festive spirit and contagious good humor that seemed to radiate from Mr. Claus.

“What do you mean, ‘Jolly Cobsmas’!?” Boxman fumed and stomped his foot. “All this trouble and for what? How can there be a Cobsmas without a Mr. Claus! I don’t even have a target to shoot at now!”

“There’s always next year,” Mr. Logic offered, having appeared next to him. “Perhaps you can try again then?”

“You bet I’m going to!” Boxman shook a finger at him. “So what if you can’t help being a hero! I’m going to keep trying to spoil your Cobsmas anyway!”

“I can’t help it?” Mr. Logic blinked. “Oh. Well. I see. That doesn’t sound so bad,” he smiled. “I’ll take it as my own little Cobsmas miracle.”

Boxman fluffed up, but didn’t contradict him.

“By the way, would you like to join us for Cobsmas eve? Miss Sphinxen is inviting everyone who wants to join.”

“Of course not! I’m going to get Laser and...” he blinked in realization. “Laser?” Boxman looked around. There were no black cat-ears sticking out of the crowd anywhere, and no shiny black hair.

“Laser, where are you?”

But Laserblast was nowhere to be found. Boxman went around in the crowd looking for him, but he was gone.

Eventually, he stood and stared from the side at the happy scene at the bodega where people were celebrating Mr. Claus and Cobsmas and each other. It was starting to snow, and it would get dark soon. 

It was Cobsmas eve, and Boxman realized he was alone.

He supposed he should have expected it, really.

“Where’s boss?” Fink asked from inside his labcoat pocket.

“Oh, my Cob!” Boxman jumped out of his skin and held her up. “Then… did I just _steal a baby_!?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, no! Where did he go!? Where did he goooooo!?


	8. The True Meaning of Cobsmas

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaand finally, here's just a pic of our villains, being happy with each other.
> 
> Enjoy!

♪♪♪ On the last day of Cobsmas, my baby gave to me his true love ♪♪♪

* * *

Lad Boxman sat in his workshop, as he usually did on Cobsmas, and sighed, which was not at all usual. Fink, who he had decided to keep, was playing a game with his bots that seemed to involve a screwdriver, Darrell’s bolts and a lot of shouting. At least _someone_ was having fun, he thought glumly.

He did not, as a rule, have strong feelings about Cobsmas either way - he didn’t go out of his way to celebrate it, and since his parents lived far away, didn’t bother going to spend it with them; but until Mr. Logic had left him to set up shop at the newly-built eyesore of a plaza with its heroes and its obnoxious decorations and all, he had never hated it either. And this year, it had started out so promising, too…

He sighed again and drew a bomb doodle on his empty drawing board.

He didn’t get along with people easily, which suited him just fine, and even less so with heroes, which was just as well because it was kind of a job requirement. Furthermore, most people of any inclination didn’t get along with him or his robots. So what were the chances of a cool, unhinged, pleasantly evil, single hero with a baby rat literally showing up at his door a week before Cobsmas and making it so much _fun_ , for once?

Boxman froze in the middle of drawing another bomb, threw an alarmed look at Fink and ran over that thought once again. 

Had a hot, single dad of a holiday-spirited little girl just shown him the True Spirit of Cobs-

“ _Nononono_ ,” he shook his head vehemently and hopped off his stool. “Let’s pretend we didn’t just think that. I wonder what’s happening at the plaza. They must be celebrating, the nasty little heroes,” he mumbled and stormed off to his office.

* * *

Carol and Mr. Gar stood in front of the bodega unaware of the grumbling villain watching them through his binoculars from the other side of the highway. Carol had her backpack on her shoulder, and Mr. Gar had an utterly smitten expression on his face.

“B-but it’s Cobsmas,” he stammered, “do you have to go back right now?”

“I’m afraid so, Gene,” Carol said, smiling. “Thank you for having me, I had a great Cobsmas eve thanks to you.” 

Mr. Gar almost melted at that.

“And the party at Ms. Sphinxen’s yesterday was lovely, and her daughter Mummy is just the cutest!” Carol went on. “Please, say hi from me when you see them again.”

“Y-you could come see them again and say hi yourself,” Mr. Gar managed, very proud of his inspired subtlety.

“I guess I could,” Carol laughed and took a look around the plaza. “Lakewood seems wonderful, and the people around you do, too. It makes me wish...” she trailed off.

“We have a dojo for rent!” Mr. Gar blurted. “Brand-new! Very affordable! Great location! Do you want to have a tour!?”

Carol stared, slightly startled. Mr. Gar sweated.

“You know what,” Carol finally said, “I think I will, next time I visit. If you haven't rented it out until then.”

“I won’t!”

“But for now, I really have to go help Rippy. Mr. Claus may have been found, but explaining all this to Congress and POINT will be… really something,” Carol winced. “Also, Rippy ended up alone at HQ and working on Cobsmas eve because of this whole mess. And now she’s texting me that she wants to quit and pursue her PhD,” Carol looked down at the phone in her hand. 

“I can’t say I blame her,” Mr. Gar grumbled.

“I suppose you won’t be coming back to POINT?”

“It’s not for me,” he shook his head. “It never was. I’m more about… providing and nurturing these days. More than one way to be a hero, you know.”

“Yeah,” Carol agreed and took a careful look at his face. “You do look a lot happier here.”

“I am.”

Carol’s taxi arrived just then, and they hugged and said goodbye, for the moment. They looked at each other as the taxi left.

* * *

Carol had not been joking about Rippy’s increasingly exasperated texts. As her taxi pulled out of Lakewood Plaza Turbo, a certain cumulus hero in Lakewood received a call from POINT and almost burned down her own house with startled lightning.

Sunshine, who was big enough to admit that her approach to building her heroic career may have been slightly opportunistic, had not spent the best Cobsmas eve. She still lamented the recommendation letter that she would never receive. Seeing that big city hero drop to his knees and proudly declare he wanted to be a _villain_ , of all things, on top of saying _that_ about charisma had left her somewhat shaken.

So when her phone rang and none other than POINT’s resident boxing champion told her she had, in fact, received a recommendation letter detailing her ‘leadership skills’, ‘surveillance skills’, ‘teamwork’ and _‘charisma’_ and wanted to interview her for joining asap, she had unleashed an entire party of lightning sprites over her neighborhood.

In fact, the only question she had not been able to answer on her impromptu phone interview was about Laserblast’s whereabouts. It struck her as odd for his own teammates to be asking that, but then again, what did she know about what big city heroes got up to?

She was very excited to find out, though.

* * *

One more person asking after Laserblast’s whereabouts was Mr. Logic, turning up at Boxmore’s door with an entire Cobsmas corn cake sliced into eight pieces.

“I don’t know where he is,” Boxman replied, fluffing up. “I’m not his keeper.”

“But it’s completely illogical for him not to be here!” Mr. Logic exclaimed in a miracle of tactfulness.

Boxman slammed the factory doors in his face and was about to use some very corn-related phrases, when he realized that eight very big and shiny eyes were looking up at him from around knee-level.

“Oh, poop,” he deflated. “You saw the cake, didn’t you.”

The bots and Fink nodded enthusiastically.

“Resorting to culinary bribes to turn my kids against me and use them as leverage, eh?” he said appraisingly at the confused Mr. Logic still standing outside with his cake. “Positively _villainous_ of you,” he nodded in satisfaction. “Maybe making you wasn’t such a flop after all.”

“That is...” Mr. Logic blinked and went on very innocently, “very _generous_ and _holiday-spirited_ of you to let me share this cake with you and my siblings. Maybe you’re _not so bad_ yourself.”

“Gimme that cake, will you?” Boxman grabbed the tray and took aim at Mr. Logic’s face.

“Daddyyyyyy!” the bots wailed.

“Caaaaaake!” Fink roared.

Boxman’s eye twitched and after an internal struggle, he valiantly deigned to allow Mr. Logic to join them in the kitchen while they polished off the cake. Mr. Logic beamed and wisely didn’t make any further comments.

* * *

It was fun to watch Mr. Logic first get chewed on by Fink, who had turned out to be more destructive than some villains Boxman knew, and then get roasted by the bots for his ‘ancient’ design (he was so proud of his babies for their big vocabulary and good taste in humiliating heroes). And the corn cake wasn’t completely horrible either.

However, Boxman’s eyes kept darting towards the squashed box of cherry suckers in one corner of the kitchen, and then to Fink, and then he had to force himself to pay attention to the bots and not to check yet again his stubbornly silent phone.

He had never gotten Laser’s number. Well, neither had Laser gotten his, but Boxmore’s number was plastered onto every surface available for cheap advertisement that Boxman had been able to find. His eyes darted to Fink again.

“Surely, he won’t abandon his kid?” Boxman thought. “He used to call his ex every day to check up on the baby rat.”

He shook his head and poked at the corn cake. Stupid heroes. He should have known better than to get involved with stupid, self-righteous, sneaky, sly heroes who just happened to be good with his kids, and fun, and who looked at him like he was a moon-sized glorb…

“What did that cake do to you?” Fink asked next to him, watching approvingly at the violent stabbing in progress in Boxman’s plate.

“Here, you can have it,” he pushed the plate to her.

“EW,” Fink said with supreme disdain and scrunched up her nose. “You want me to eat leftovers? What do you think I am, a sewer rat?”

“But you said you love sewers,” Darrell chimed in helpfully.

“Fine then. Robots, you can have it,” he said before a shouting match could erupt. “And Fink, you can have the last piece. Your boss isn’t here to eat it anyway.”

Boxman pretended not to see the worried look on Mr. Logic’s face when he served the last piece of the corn cake to Fink. Stupid heroes.

“By the way,” Mr. Logic faked a cough. “Did you hear what happened to Mr. Claus and Kris?”

“Who?”

“The man he was impersonating at the mall?” Mr. Logic rolled his eyes just a tiny bit. “They reached a very logical solution to the Cobsmas problem.”

“Oh? Did they abolish it, never to be spoken of again?” Boxman offered sarcastically.

“That is not logical at all,” Mr. Logic frowned. “From next year, Kris is going to officially assume the position of Santa! Isn’t it exciting?”

“Very,” Boxman deadpanned, looking sourly away.

“In fact,” Mr. Logic plowed on, “there will be a ceremony this afternoon in Lakewood town square. Why don’t we all go?”

“What! No way! If I never see that guy again, it’ll be too soon!”

“There will be balloons and decorations and presents for the kids,” Mr. Logic dealt his final blow.

“Dadddyyyyyyy!!” the bots wailed.

“Preseeeeents!!” Fink shouted.

Boxman tried to plug his ears with his hands, but he was jumped and tackled by the excited bunch of kids. He lost balance and toppled backward with his chair.

“Yeah, sure,” he finally grumbled, trying to stop seeing dancing stars and cherry suckers.

On the other hand, it might be a good thing to get out of Boxmore for a bit, he decided.

* * *

Getting out of Boxmore had been a huge mistake, Boxman decided as he watched Dynamite Watkins excitedly talk about the exciting events that had so excited the exciting town of Lakewood and about all the excitement everyone was feeling. Excitedly. Shannon was chewing on the back of his faceplate, and he also wanted to chew through something.

Despite his best efforts, Cobsmas was happening. He supposed he had to count it as a sort of victory that this year, it would have to happen without a Santa, but he just glared at the two cheerful old men who were hugging and extolling each other on a hastily built stage smack in front of Lakewood’s town hall for their impromptu ceremony in front of the pink-cheeked, disgustingly holiday-spirited crowd of onlookers.

When Mr. Logic started to applaud Mr. Claus’s touching story about his valiant and heroic personal struggle with the loss of his powers, Boxman quietly ditched him in the crowd and herded the bots away. He could remember too well being in the same place only five days ago, under very different circumstances. 

Even the kissing booth was still there, Boxman realized. He couldn’t help elbowing a few people out of the way to see who was in it now. 

He began to elbow a lot more energetically when he saw a pair of pointy black ears bopping above the heads of the onlookers.

Boxman almost fell on his face when he emerged from the press of the crowd only to find out that there was a large empty bubble around the booth. He stared into the giggling face of what looked like an old purple werefox with nekomimi on its head.

“Jolly Cobsmas, sir!” the horrible apparition shouted and made a kissy face. “Would you like to help a charitable cause this Cobsmas?”

Boxman grabbed all of his bots and Fink and did a runner.

“Phwash,” he mumbled under his breath, wheezing, as he leaned on a lamp post a safe distance away from everyone. “Danged corny heroes, who needs ‘em anyway.”

And of course, right on cue, the town square speakers disguised as the horns of cherubic winged ears of baby corn, blasted that most Cobsmasy of all songs, ‘Holding out for a hero’. 

Boxman facepalmed and valiantly struggled through “Where have all the good men gone?” and “Isn't there a white knight upon a fiery steed?” because, after all, there was no way that the universe was _that_ obviously out to get him personally, right?

But when the inspired singer reached the second “I need a hero,” Boxman did a speedrun through all five stages of grief, roared off the top of his voice, and grabbed the baby bots, turning them into a plasma cannon once again. Fink on his shoulder cheered, holding on to his tuft of hair. He shot all the speakers he could see, and even though it didn’t stop the music completely, he felt a lot better.

“You know what!?” he shouted at the cowering crowd and aimed next for the giant screen showing Mr. Claus and Kris. “I can still ruin Cobsmas! I don’t need to find its personification, when the whole of Lakewood is right here, waiting for me to wreck it! And no amount of stupid heroes or villains are going to stop me from doing what I want to do! _I’m a villain, Cob dang it_!”

Fink and the bots in his cannon cheered, and so did he, hopping around and shooting up into the sky a few times.

Then there was a gasp.

“Oh my Cob, Boxy, _you’re so evil_! <3 How can you be so evil!? <3”

Boxman whirled around, and there was none other than Laserblast, standing on the curb next to the taxi stand, with his coat and his suitcase and his absolutely smitten, blushing face.

Boxman pointed the cannon at him. 

The cannon, however, split into four ecstatic baby robots who ran towards Laser, accompanied by Fink on all fours. So, betrayed by his own firepower, the pouting villain had no choice but to join the tearful reunion.

“And what are you waltzing back here for?” he tried to look angrily fluffed up, but it mostly came out ruffled. “Who did you lose this time? Other than your pet rat, that is,” and he pointed to Fink who was already nestled in her beloved boss’s fluffy hood.

“I handed in my resignation, Boxy,” Laser smiled wide, looking younger and more carefree than Boxman had ever seen him. “And exchanged some choice corn-related words with a few people in the process.”

“You did?” Boxman’s eyes widened.

“And then, I had to pack my stuff and clean up a few things in Neo Riot City,” Laser went on. “By the way, I mailed the rest of my junk to Boxmore. I hope that’s alright with you.”

“You’re moving here? For real?” Boxman squeaked. “Right now?”

“Well… I thought...” Laser’s smile wilted somewhat, his expression closing. “Of course, I can find a hotel-”

“NO!” Boxman shouted and immediately blushed and looked away. “No sense in doing that. I mean, Boxmore’s big, plenty of space for everyone. Plus, the hotel prices this time of year are...” he trailed off mumbling.

“Boxy?” Laser called and his smile warmed up again. “I… I meant everything I said yesterday. The way I left wasn’t ideal, but I couldn’t deal with that whole mess. I just wanted to finish everything once and for all and move on. But that doesn’t change how I feel.”

“Really?” Boxman’s eyes had become impossibly large and shiny. “You really still want to be a villain?”

Laser nodded.

“And you… you still want _me_?”

“Absolutely. And if you want _me_ , just come here,” Laser said and opened his arms, decorated by baby bots handing off his coat sleeves.

Boxman hugged him with such gusto that only years of rigorous heroics stopped Laser from toppling over. He hugged him back just as enthusiastically.

“I love you, Boxy,” Laser murmured in his hair. “Let’s be evil together.”

“Oh, I love you too!” Boxman said into his chest and sobbed happily. “I missed… we all missed you so much for Cobsmas eve. It sucked even more than usual without you.”

“We still have Cobsmas day,” Laser said soothingly. “We can make up for the lost time. We can celebrate today! Besides, I can tell you that Mr. Claus was wrong in all of his theories about what his notorious True Spirit of Cobsmas (TM) is, so we haven’t really missed anything.”

“Is that so?” Boxman grinned up and raised his eyebrows. “Will I live to see _you_ giving a Cobsmas speech?”

“Cobsmas is about being home with those you care about, and being safe and happy and who you are, no matter how crazy the world outside may seem,” Laser bopped Boxman’s nose. “So every day can be Cobsmas, if we’re together and we want it to be.”

“ _Laser…_ ” Against all odds, Boxman’s eyes managed to become even bigger and shinier and more full of stars. He had to bury his face in Laser’s abs again. 

“It’s alright, fellow villain,” he said eventually, assuming a solemn expression. “I won’t tell anyone you said that. And if anyone finds out, we’ll chalk it down to residual hero cooties.”

“Oh, just come here,” Laser chuckled and grabbed Boxman, lifting him up to proper kissing height. Boxman’s stubby legs immediately wrapped against his waist and he giggled.

“This is the best Cobsmas ever,” Boxman said and kissed his grinning partner-in-crime.

* * *

That same evening, the newly increased population of Boxmore gathered once again for a proper Cobsmas dinner, after having wrecked downtown Lakewood only a little bit. After all, wrecking things was all nice and well, but it wasn’t all villainy was about, and it was cold, and they had Cobsmas traditions to catch up with, and that Cobsmas dinner with its 13 traditional corn dishes wasn’t going to cook itself. (As it had turned out, Laser was much, _much_ better at cooking up complicated potions than anything even remotely edible.) Laser even managed to swipe a bot-sized plastic Cobsmas tree from the town square decorations.

“You know, Laser,” Boxman fidgeted when they were almost ready with the preparations. “About what I said before...”

“Hm?” Laser asked, distractedly trying to puzzle out the use of a bag of microwave popcorn. 

“Well, I said I hate heroes,” Boxman clarified, hugging protectively a big bowl of potato-and-corn salad. “But, ehm, you… you don't have to give it up on my account. Sure, I’ll grumble, but… if you wanted to still be a hero, I don’t mind! I don’t want to make you turn into a villain. Just… just saying.”

There was a bit of a pause.

“You couldn’t make me be anything, even if you wanted to,” Laser said carefully. “I really want to be a villain. That I get to be it _with you_ is only a bonus.”

“Oh! Okay then!” Boxman grinned, looking relieved.

“And actually, I don’t think I’ll be going by ‘Laser’ anymore,” he added. “I’m not that anymore. Plus, I was thinking about going back to academia for a while, and all my diplomas are in my civvie name. Lakewood is a growing town, it needs a university.”

“You mean I- you- we-” Baxman sputtered, “and I didn’t even know your actual _name_!?”

“Didn’t you know that superheroes usually go by nicknames?” the ex-hero chuckled and grabbed the ruffled villain and his corn salad in a tight hug. “Also, it’s just that mine is not a very good name for a hero.”

“What is it?”

“It’s Venomous.”

Boxman stared up, starry-eyed. “Oh, boy,” he squeaked.

“What?” 

“You’re going to be a supervillain, aren’t you?”

“What can I say, I’m an ambitious guy,” Venomous smirked, took away his salad and kissed Boxman thoroughly.

“Oh, and by the way,” he added casually, once Boxman was pleasantly dazed. “I might take up Billiam on his business offer. And blackmail him with that video we took. Aaaand then probably email it to his dad anyway.”

“Just promise me you’ll rob him blind and make him beg, please?” Boxman sighed, rubbing his cheek happily against Venomous’s abs.

“He won’t know what hit him.”

The two villains looked at each other, and then cackled evilly. Fink and the bots came to see what fun they were missing, and were promptly loaded with food to be carried to the table, decorated with the plastic Cobsmas tree and some of the bots own toys.

“I told you,” Venomous surveyed the scene with satisfaction. “We can have a great Cobsmas anytime.”

“In that case, _Venomous_ ,” Boxman grinned and took his hand, “Jolly Cobsmas to you.”

“And a Jolly Cobsmas to you too, _my Boxy_.”

* * *

A few days later, one Dr. Venomous would have to face the POW card machines and get a brand-new card for his brand-new calling. He would be slightly touchy because of it, and expect the machine to spew his old level as a hero, maybe adjusted for his latest Cobsmas-time exploits; and having all of that to bring to the negatives would be no easy task, even with the enthusiasm he and Boxman went at it.

However, little did he know that somewhere else, someone else had the exact opposite problem.

Mr. Claus sat in his old armchair by his fireplace and regarded his brand-new POW card with mixed feelings. At least one of them was embarrassment. That was because Mr. Claus, an ordinary citizen, had a bright red, incriminating -1 on his card. 

He wasn’t sure if it was the bonking on the head and robbing of a part-timer Santa, or the forcing of a miracle on someone who explicitly stated he didn’t want it, or the abandoning of the pink baby rat with twisted miracles sticking out of it like a magical hedgehog, but in hindsight, he didn’t feel particularly proud of any of those. He may have been… a bit too focused on his retirement, he realized.

But it was Cobsmas day, and the magic of the holiday was still at its strongest, and so Mr. Claus got up, closed all of his curtains, locked his doors, and rubbed his hands.

“Ho-ho-ho,” he said with a mischievous glint in his eyes and used his this-time-it’s-the-last-no-like-rly-honest-I-promise-last miracle to swap his own POW card number with that of someone who he knew would appreciate it a lot more. Plus, _nobody_ got the last word on miracles if not Mr. Claus, former personification of Cobsmas.

* * *

And that is the story of how one of the most eventful Cobsmases in Lakewood history came to a conclusion. Its magic stayed with everyone it had touched, and especially a certain new family of villains. And while the turning of a famous superhero to a villain didn’t seem to many like a very festive thing, those who knew better understood that many way worse events had been averted.

Apropos of nothing at all, somewhere in NRC, a janitor tasked to clear up a newly vacated lab knocked over a vial of purple liquid with some nasty, shadowy figure seemingly swirling inside it. He shrugged, splashed a generous amount of bleach on the stain on the floor and happily mopped it down the drain, never ever to be seen again.

\---The End---

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AND IT'S A WRAP!!! Thank you so much for reading so far, you're amazing!
> 
> A million thanks to [anonymousEDward](https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymousEDward/pseuds/anonymousEDward) who did a speedy proofread of the whole fic on an extremely short notice in a feat of superhuman proofreading valor! (Ed, you're the best! <3) Any remaining errors, inconsistencies and plotholes are entirely mine.
> 
> And once again, I would totally
> 
> **LOVE**
> 
> to hear what you thought of the fic, the characters, or just to get a few sparkly emoji! Comments of any length are welcome anytime!
> 
> I hope you had fun, and see you around!


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